01A general’s maidam
Maidams are the burial mounds of the Ahom royal family and great nobles, a vault of brick or stone heaped over with earth into a low hill, with an octagonal wall and a small shrine on top. Most stand at Charaideo, the first Ahom capital. Lachit Borphukan, who had retaken Guwahati in 1667 and broken Raja Ram Singh’s fleet at Saraighat in March 1671, fell ill and died about a year after his victory, in 1672. King Udayaditya Singha had his remains laid in a maidam at Hoollongapar, about 16 km from Jorhat, close to the old hollong forest that is now the Hollongapar Gibbon Sanctuary.
02Lachit Divas and the statue
For two centuries the maidam was known mostly to the people around it. In the early twentieth century villages of Upper Assam began to keep 24 November, Lachit’s birthday, as Lachit Divas, and the historian S. K. Bhuyan’s work on the Buranjis made his story known across India. The Assam government now marks the day each year, and the National Defence Academy gives a Lachit Borphukan gold medal to its best cadet. On 9 March 2024 the Prime Minister unveiled a bronze Statue of Valour of Lachit at the maidam site, 125 feet high with its base, part of a memorial park around the old mound.
The life of this place
- 1672Lachit Borphukan dies; Udayaditya Singha raises his maidam.
- 1947S. K. Bhuyan publishes Lachit Barphukan and His Times.
- 9 March 2024The Statue of Valour is unveiled at the maidam.
On the Jorhat–Mariani road; Lachit Divas on 24 November draws the largest gathering.
