Language Rights and Musical Movements: Zubeen Garg as a Voice of Assam

Zubeen performed cultural constitutionalism. He made cultural rights lived realities not through legal argument but through melody, performance, and reinvention.

Introduction

Language in India is closely linked to questions of identity, belonging, and recognition. It is simultaneously a political instrument and a poetic inheritance. The Constitution of India (COI) recognised the pluralistic nature of this linguistic landscape, safeguarding distinct cultures under Article 29¹ and mandating mother tongue instruction through Article 350-A². However, linguistic rights are often more aspirational than enforceable. They rely heavily on civic engagement, mobilisation, and culture.³ In the Northeast India, and particularly Assam, it is music that has carried these rights from abstraction into lived practice. Historically, Assamese music has been the repository of cultural assertion, from Srimanta Sankaradeva’s devotional Borgeets to Bhupen Hazarika’s revolutionary ballads.⁴ In this lineage, Zubeen Garg emerges as a transitional figure, embodying the anxieties and aspirations of a post-liberalisation generation.⁵

Zubeen’s creations cannot be confined to one genre.⁶ It spans Assamese folk, Bihu songs, romantic ballads, philosophical reflections, Bollywood hits, and fiery protest music. His voice became synonymous with Assam’s assertion of linguistic pride. Additionally, his songs carried universal themes of love, wandering, and freedom. He thus exemplifies how music can serve as jurisprudence making rights audible, intelligible, and emotionally compelling.

Zubeen Garg: Cultural biography

Born on 18-11-1972, Zubeen Garg’s birth marked the beginning of a journey that would transcend music itself. Named after the legendary composer Zubin Mehta, his very name embodied a sense of artistic aspiration that would later define his life.⁷ Born Zubeen Borthakur in Tura, Meghalaya, and hailing from Jorhat, Assam, he later adopted “Garg” from his family’s gotra, symbolising a synthesis of rooted Assamese identity and cosmopolitan outlook.⁸ His career spanned three decades, during which he sang in over 40 languages, but his cultural anchor was always Assamese. His debut album, “Anamika” (1992), was a watershed moment in Assamese popular music, bringing cultural revolution in Assam. His journey to people’s heart continued with the release of several other albums, viz. “Maya”, “Asha”, and “Pakhi”, etc. Each song’s lyrics and composition generate new hopes amongst people of different generation. Each creation becoming an instrument to make people understand the significance of balancing cultural roots and globalisation.

Zubeen was a composer, lyricist, actor, director, and activist. His Bollywood breakthrough with “Ya Ali” (2006) brought him national fame, yet he deliberately stayed tied to Assam, performing in small towns and lending his voice to protests.⁹ His political persona matured during the Anti-CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) protests, where he became a cultural leader of resistance. His sudden death in Singapore in September 2025 created an unprecedented outpouring of grief, demonstrating the extent to which his music was woven into everyday life.

Language rights in the Indian constitutional framework

The COI places language at the core of cultural rights. Article 29 protects the rights of communities with distinct languages, scripts, or cultures by guaranteeing their right to preserve these identities and prohibiting denial of admission to State-funded educational institutions on grounds such as language. Article 30(1) further strengthens minority rights by granting all religious and linguistic minorities the right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice. Article 350-A places a duty on States to provide adequate facilities for primary education in the mother tongue of children from linguistic minority groups.¹⁰ These provisions are reinforced by the Eighth Schedule, which lists 22 languages, including Assamese.

Indian judiciary has interpreted the centrality of linguistic autonomy in various pronouncements. In D.A.V. College v. State of Punjab¹¹, the Supreme Court held that religious or linguistic minorities with a distinct script, may invoke Articles 29(1) and 30(1) to protect their language, script, and cultural identity. In State of Karnataka v. English Medium Primary & Secondary Schools¹², the Supreme Court held that the right to choose the medium of instruction at the primary stage forms part of the freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a), and that Articles 29(1) and 30(1) protect the autonomy of linguistic minorities to determine the medium of instruction in schools they establish.

Thus, these decisions create a robust constitutional shield around linguistic identity. Yet scholars such as Arzoz caution that these rights remain political as much as legal, mediated through social struggle rather than enforceable claims.¹³ In Assam, this mediation takes the form of music, where artists like Zubeen translate constitutional language into cultural assertion.

Music as Assamese assertion: The songs as jurisprudence

Music has historically served as the soundtrack of Assam’s identity struggles. During the Assam Agitation (1979-1985), songs articulated political demands for safeguarding Assamese culture.¹⁴ Zubeen inherited this tradition but refashioned it for a new era. His repertoire illustrates multiple registers of cultural assertion:

1. Romantic ballads as soft resistance

At first glance, songs like “Mayabini Ratir Bukut”, “Rumal”, “Piritir Hubakhe”, “Monor Nijanot”, “Kaar Porosh”, and “Etia Junake” appear to be gentle romantic ballads.¹⁵ Yet in the socio-political context of Assam, especially during the 1990s and early 2000s, these seemingly personal songs carried a deeper, coded resistance.¹⁶ For instance, songs like “Kaar Porosh” and “Etia Junake” expressed longing not only for a beloved but for peace, stability, and a sense of safety that felt distant. “Mayabini Ratir Bukut” portrayed illusion as romantic and existential. “Monor Nijanot” spoke of loneliness that resonated deeply in a society often feeling isolated from the Indian mainstream.

Thus, in a time of political tension, Zubeen’s romantic ballads asserted emotional liberty. These songs provided a subdued yet potent jurisprudence of the heart, in which the act of loving became an assertion of dignity and resistance.

2. Philosophical and existential reflections: Rights through melody

Moreover, Zubeen’s repertoire includes collection of songs that addresses existential issues, moral dilemmas, and pursuit of life. Tracks such as “Shanti Diya, Mukti Diya”, “Shabda”, “Nayak Hobo Khuji”, “Achina Dexote”, “Anuradha”, and “Hikoli” are philosophical meditations rendered in sound.¹⁷ For example, “Shanti Diya, Mukti Diya” turns into an appeal for emotional and social release. “Shabda” demonstrates the power of the words and the weight of silence. It reflects a society where speech has often been policed, suppressed, or feared. Songs like “Nayak Hobo Khuji” and “Achina Dexote” map the journey of a young person searching for identity in an unfamiliar, globalising world.¹⁸ “Hikoli” invokes metaphors of bondage and freedom. It reminds listeners of the psychological restraints imposed by social expectations, political conflict, and historical trauma.

Thus, through these songs, Zubeen crafted affective constitutionalism, where listeners encountered lived versions of the constitutional values of human dignity, personal liberty, and the autonomy to choose one’s path — not through legal texts, but through melody and metaphor.

3. Cultural revival: Folk forms as living constitutionalism

A crucial dimension of Zubeen’s legacy lies in his ability to revive, reinterpret, and reinvigorate Assam’s folk and devotional traditions for a new generation. His work across Bihu songs, folk ballads, and devotional forms like Borgeets demonstrated that culture can evolve without losing its authenticity. Through songs, such as “Pakhi Pakhi Aei Mon”, “Bokul Phulor Dore”, “O Mure Lorar Mak”, “Junakor Boroxun”, “Kahi Bati”, “Dihingor Gora”, “Agoli Bahore Gogona Bojai”, “Gagori Kokalot”, “Janmoni”, and “Bahi Bahi Bahi Tumi”, Zubeen carried forward the rhythmic pulse and emotional depth of Assamese folk culture.¹⁹ For instance, songs like “Agoli Bahore Gogona Bojai”, “Dhol Bajil Taal Bajil” and “Gagori Kokalot” foreground the “gogona”, “dhol”, “taal”, “khol” embedding sonic signatures of Assamese identity in mainstream listening spaces. Moral and emotional themes of traditional Assamese folklore are echoed in songs like “O Mure Lorar Mak” and “Dihingor Gora”.²⁰ He reminded the youth who were drifting toward global pop culture that their heritage was not outdated but adaptable and alive.

Thus, Zubeen performed cultural constitutionalism. He made cultural rights lived realities not through legal argument but through melody, performance, and reinvention.

4. Protest music and the Anti-CAA Movement

Zubeen’s most explicit political intervention unfolded during the Anti-CAA protests (2019-2020), when music, identity, and constitutional resistance converged. His presence amongst the public during the protest transformed protest sites into cultural arenas. At one of the mass gatherings, Zubeen performed an emotionally charged rendition of “Mrityu Atiya Xohoj” (death is easy) which moved the crowd into a collective lament for those killed during the agitation.²¹ People played his songs like “Maya” and “Politics Nokoriba Bondhu” on their phones, transforming everyday public spaces into micro-arenas of dissent.²²

Hence, these musical registers indicate why Zubeen Garg was not merely a singer but a cultural jurist. He demonstrated that jurisprudence is not confined to courts or texts; it also resides in songs that console, provoke, mobilise, and unite.

Conclusion

Zubeen Garg’s musical journey demonstrates that the most enduring guardians of language rights are not always courts, legislatures, or official policies but the cultural practices that ordinary people sustain through sound, memory, and emotion. Assam’s constitutional identity has long been shaped by artistic expression — devotional, folk, romantic, and political and Zubeen stands at the centre of this continuum. His songs transformed constitutional guarantees into lived experiences. Article 29 was heard in the rhythms of folk revival, Article 19(1)(a) in protest performances, and the dignity promised by the Preamble in his romantic ballads that affirmed humanity even in times of fear.

To conclude, Zubeen Garg does not simply belong to the history of Assamese music — he belongs to the constitutional history of India. His songs remain enduring evidence to what it means for a community to assert its place, its language, and its soul through melody. And as long as those songs continue to echo across Assam, the rights they embodied will endure vibrant, contested, cherished, and profoundly alive.