Don Bosco Museum

Tradition and culture are something that touches every individual’s heart and always stand with its own pride. Don Bosco Museum in Shillong is a place which can touch yours thought with its unique representation of the richness of the eight states of India's North East culture. It represents the multi-color cultures, lifestyles, history, and traditions of the indigenous peoples of North East India is one place that was opened for general people in 2010. Don Bosco Museum stands with its hexagonal shape moreover, the area of this museum is spread over 56,000 sq km floor space and more than 15,000 sq km of display wall space not only that it is Asia’s largest museum of indigenous cultures. It will take your few hours to explore the museum fully. This place has been toured by the eminent people from Rajya Sabha as well as the princess of Thailand. The museum has its own publications, blog as well as a research center.

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Agriculture Gallery: This gallery represents the agricultural practices of the region which will show you several agricultural techniques that have in North East India such as wet rice cultivation, shifting cultivation, plough cultivation, etc.

Art Gallery: The art gallery is one of the richest galleries in the museum, there have a huge and unique collection of rare paintings and quirky artifacts from different parts of the North-Eastern region. All of this has been sourced from various corners of North East India and include bamboo, cane craft, stonework, metal art, tribal jewellery collections, unusual collections of utensils, statuettes, paintings, etc which opened a new window of human creativity

Basketry Gallery: This is a gallery with bamboo work. There have an extensive collection of bamboo baskets made in North East India. Those styles are nearly closed to the Manipuri style of Bamboo weaving as well as there have bamboo headgear, rain shields, utensils, etc.

Costumes & Ornaments Gallery: North East India has its own unique tradition, including ornaments so this gallery will help you to explore the unique tribal ornaments and jewellery that people living in North India use for their makeover. They make them by using distinct objects such as feathers, beads, metal, semi-precious stones, bamboo, cloth, and stitched patches.

Fishing and Hunting Gallery: The display of this gallery deals with hunting and hunting-related artifacts and weapons, which are carefully displayed as well as each exhibit is written with instructions.

Housing Gallery: in this spectators, anyone can explore the different types of traditional houses architectural styles along with the materials that are used to build traditional houses such as leaves, sticks, bamboo, wooden planks, grass, mud, and hay.

Introductory and Prehistory Gallery: One of the most interesting galleries where one can fount out the sketches, models, skull exhibits, and paintings depicting the history and the social and cultural evolution of man. Also a lot of information on the demographic structure of the Northeast.

Land and People Gallery: this portion of the studio will show you an excellent overview of the people and topographical aspects of the area. The diversity of people in the region is illustrated by a huge concentration of bust sculptures and life-size shapes.

Language Museum:  this window will give a glimpse of the language structure of this area there have more than 200 languages displayed as well as chart representation of spoken languages in different parts of North-east of India.

Musical Instruments Gallery: it’s a place of musical instruments that have been used in the North-Eastern region likewise Bihu dance from Assam, PungCholom from Manipur are some of the popular folk dances from this side of India.

Photo Gallery: This exhibit will give you an illustration of these areas people and their works in black and white touch.

Culture and Religion Gallery: This gallery mainly focuses on the cultural side and regional differences of the North-Eastern people.

Alchoves Gallery: in this gallery, one will feel the touch of different aspects of the Northeast India such as the traditional Saint-Lin-woven Maufaran, Aptami in rice paddies, Lake Lotak, Manipuri dances, etc.

Weapons Gallery: This part is a window where one can find out different types of weapons used by different communities in the Northeast to protect themselves from wild animals.

Mission and Culture Gallery: This gallery divide into 4 sections which describe the cultural diversity of Northeast India. Also, there have a skyway gallery and our neighbors’ gallery. This place is full of the cultural view of the history and traditions of the indigenous peoples of North East India if one tries to explore the tradition of this area then she/he should try a trip through this museum.

Timing: The museum is open from Monday to Saturday and remains closed on Sundays its opening hours are from 9 am to 5:30 pm. However, in winter it closes at 4:30 pm.

How to go: Don Bosco Museum is located in Shillong city which is 3.5 km from Police Bazar and 3 kilometers from the Shillong Bus Stand. By taxi, it takes about 15 minutes to reach there from Police Bazar. If one prefers to go by bus then there have two kinds of bus service in Shillong one is Shillong city bus and another is Bazaar bus. However, there has a service for tourists called tourist bus. there also have Airport and railway service which will help you to reach your destination, Shillong Airport where have flights from Kolkata only which have been placed some 30 km away from the city and it is the nearest airport. The main airport to Shillong is in Guwahati which is connected with other parts of India. Guwahati Airport is approximately 120 km away from Shillong city. The nearest railway station is also located in Guwahati.

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Written by, Md. Sadik Adnan

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