Arunachal had the first encounter with Christianity with the coming of the French Missionaries Krick and Bourry who were martyred in Somme village in 1854 on their way to Tibet. The arrival of Salesian Missionaries in Assam later in 1922 was a landmark in the history of the Church as Religious and educational institutions of the Church gradually welcomed the people of the region to a new life of faith and all-round development.

Contact by students of Arunachal Pradesh in Colleges in Shillong and Assam gradually opened the way for faith in Arunachal Pradesh. Then Rector of Don Bosco Shillong, later Bishop of Dibrugarh and then Archbishop of Guwahati, Archbishop Emeritus Thomas Menamparampil’s contact with Mr. Wanglat Lowangcha, a young tribal chief became a turning point in the history of the Church in Arunachal Pradesh.

Bishop Robert Kerketta and Bishop Thomas established catechetical and educational institutions at Naharkatia and Tinsukia in Assam for the training of Catechists and youth leaders of East Arunachal. Fr. Job Kallarackal SDB pioneered the missionary work in Tirap from the Parish at Naharkatia, Assam. He brought some Noctes and Wanchos to the Faith in spite of many difficulties.

After him Fr. George Pallipparambil SDB, now Bishop of the Diocese of Miao took up the reigns. His years of contact with the Arunachal Students and Officials in Shillong had made him known to many in Arunachal. His first appointment as the Rector of Bosco Bible School (BBS) at Tinsukia, brought him closer to the Arunachal Apostolate. BBS trained youth leaders and catechists of Arunachal, who later became zealous lay evangelizers. In fact, they sowed the seeds of Catholic faith in Arunachal.

With the establishment of the first Catholic Mission, School and Hostel as well as the construction of the first ‘pakka’ (Concrete) Church at Borduria in June 1992, Fr. George became the first resident Priest in Arunachal. Mr. George Nedumala and Miss Martha Mao joined him in July the same year. He worked with lay leaders and catechists for the spread of the Gospel in the Region. He invited trained Catechists, educators, youth animators and developmental agencies for improving the religious, social, and economic conditions of the people along with other zealous missionaries.

In December 1992, the Missionaries of Charity opened their convent at Borduria to look after the poor and the needy, and especially to save the children born with minor deformities including twins. In fact, it was the then Superintendent of Police who brought the first four orphan children to the care of the MC Sisters.

On August 2, 1993, St. Mother Theresa of Calcutta visited Borduria for the dedication of the Parish Church. This created history as that was the Saint’s first and only visit to Arunachal Pradesh, “in spite of many requests for permission to visit the State …” in her own words. Health and social welfare activities gained momentum as the local leaders officially started Seva Kendra in 1990 and got it registered in 1993. In the years that followed, many religious congregations came to Arunachal. Bishop Joseph Aind SDB who became the Bishop of Dibrugarh Diocese in 1995, whole heartedly supported the expansion of faith by establishing new centres for the people in East Arunachal Pradesh.

In the year 1995, he appointed Father P K George as the coordinator of Church activities in East Arunachal. Father P K was shifted to the Literature Centre, Khonsa in 1997 and travelled extensively strengthening people’s faith and contacting various leaders. He initiated the works at Kanubari, Rajanagar, Nampong, Roing, Deomali, Kheti, Lazu, Tezu, Neotan, Miao, Minthong and Changlang.

The number of mission stations is growing ever since Pope Benedict XVI erected the Diocese of Miao on December 7, 2005 with Rev. George Pallipparambil SDB, as its first Bishop. The Episcopal Ordination took place on 26th February 2006 at Miao.

As of today, the Catholic population of East Arunachal Pradesh is about 98,600. The growing number of faithful, schools and hostels, training centres, primary health centres, and churches are a testimony to the phenomenal growth of the Church in Arunachal Pradesh.

Soon after the erection of the Diocese, Bishop George and his team made a door-to-door survey of 3000 families from around east Arunachal to find out what are the most pressing needs of the people. A few concerns stood out:
a) Education for the children
b) Health care and development activities for all
c) Promotion and conservation of local culture and dialects and environment

Responding to these requests of the people, the Diocese of Miao plunged to action with its three Registered Societies to achieve the results.

1. Seva Kendra Arunachal East (SKAE) to bring about the all-round development of the poor and vulnerable people of East Arunachal through animation, capacity building, support, promotion of people’s organization, advocacy and networking, all with respect for the tribal values and traditions.

2. Agency for Culture, Human Resources and Environmental Development (ACHRED) to promote, preserve and protect the many tribal cultures with their dialects and script and environment. And

3. The Newman Educational Society (NES) to cater to educational needs of the people.

Besides the teachings of Jesus Christ, the famous saying of the Roman Philosopher, Irenaeus, ‘Glory of God is man fully alive’ translated into the context of that time, ‘illiteracy, illness, ignorance and poverty have no religion and are to be combated by all unitedly’ gave the motivation for all the activities.

Seva Kendra Arunachal East

Seva Kendra Arunachal East (SKAE) is responsible for basic human, social and economic development in the Diocese of Miao. SKAE achieves its goal by organising and implementing social and economic projects, like women empowerment, anti-drugs and alcohol programs, youth summer camps and entrepreneurial projects. It has formed self-help groups to create a self-sustainable society.

Apart from this, it also conducts various vocational trainings like carpentry, wood carving and tailoring and weaving for both boys and girls for young boys and girls and women who dropped out of schools.

SKAE is also responsible for the healthcare of the people in our Diocese. It responds to various basic health care needs arising from different corners of our Diocese.

Similarly, the SKAE team also responds immediately to all emergency like situations like epidemic caused by malaria, flood and destruction caused by fire. Bringing about changes in the villages with regard to hygiene and cleanliness is also one important mission of SKAE. It was successful in persuading the people, through its awareness programmes, to stop the practice of keeping the dead bodies of people on elevated platforms near water sources, as consumption of contaminated water from these water sources caused a lot of sickness among the people.

It regularly undertakes many outreach programmes in the remote villages, with health awareness camp both curative and preventive, to spread awareness about the cause of various deceases and to teach ways to prevent them from spreading.

The first Hospital at Injan in Changlang District is another milestone in the history Miao Diocese. Due to lack of good hospitals locally, most travel to Assam, either to Tinsukia or Dibrugarh, or Margherita or Digboi. "There was a lot of public demand for a hospital in this area as the nearest hospital is 120 km away in Assam's Tinsukia. No other medical facility is functional nearby," Bishop George said at the dedication ceremony of the facility that aims at serving a people all around the eastern part of Arunachal Pradesh.

Activities Carried out by SKAE:
1. Formation of Self-Help Groups
2. Carpentry, Tailoring and Weaving for school dropouts
3. Intensified Malaria Control Programme
4. Medical camp for the differently able
5. Free medical camp and workshop on maternal health and hygiene
6. Awareness Rally
7. World AIDS Day with free health checkups
8. Doctor’s Day Celebrations
9. Relief Works for fire, flood, epidemic, famine and landslide victims
10. Promotion of Organic Forming
11. Creation of Famers’ Club

Districts Covered	08
Number of Health Centres	17
Hospital	1
Health Camp Conducted	476
SHG’s	246
Staff	86
Awareness Rally conducted	57
Trainings for school dropouts	82
District, State, Regional and National level-accolades	30
Income generation activities	225

Agency for Culture, Human Resources and Environmental Development

Agency for Culture, Human Resources and Environmental Development (ACHRED) was founded in 2001 by Bishop George Pallipparambil. It aims at promoting, preserving and protecting the many tribal cultures with their dialects and script and environment. With this in mind, we initiated the production of audio cassettes and CDS. Since the dialects were only in oral form, basic alphabetisation through booklets and translation of materials into local dialects were undertaken.

Besides promoting the local dialects, cultures and script, ACHRED places a strong stress on the protection and promotion of environment. The Diocese of Miao, through ACHRED has taken a noble step to go green since 2013. On the concluding day of the Annual Inter-School Cultural Fest, RADIANCE 2013 held at Divine Word School, Roing on 22nd October, 2013 it has decided to give a sapling instead of customary flowers to the Chief Guests and other dignitaries in all its common celebrations.

Hon’ble Newlai Tingkhatra of happy memory, who was present at the event as Chief Guest expressed his great happiness over this noble step and requested everyone to follow this example and congratulated Bishop George for coming up with this creative concept to promote environment.

Every academic year begins with the celebration of World Environment Day, in which the students are given awareness programmes on how they are very much connected to the nature and how an imbalance in the nature can create a lot of problems to human life. The students are taught to love the nature and discourage hunting and killing birds, and felling trees.

Bishop George asks every student to remember a very old wise poem on the promotion of environment:

‘When the last tree is cut
When the last fish is eaten
And when the last stream is poisoned
You will realize that
You cannot eat money.’
he tells everyone working in Miao Diocese.

In the year 2014, he introduced an “One Tree – One Family” plan, according to which every family in Miao Diocese was asked to plant at least one tree within the year and it was a successful imitative as every family planted at least one tree. And in 2015, he rolled out a competition on planting trees and the one who planted most number of trees in a year was awarded at the annual gathering of his team.

Responding to the lack of leaders in the local communities, ACHRED selects candidates with aptitude and sends them for coaching and trainings in different sectors in various parts of the Country. At the moment, there are several students in Civil Service coaching, modern office management, computer training and nursing in Guwahati, Bongaigaon, Bombay, Kerala, Bangalore and New Delhi.

To preserve and promote the local tribal cultures, ACHRED also inaugurated a Cultural Centre in Miao on 21 September 2023.

We need to prepare our youth today for tomorrow’s tough competitions, said Bishop George of Miao Diocese explaining the reason behind this coaching.

Number of Local Grammar Books Released	02 (Wancho and Ollo)
Number of books printed in local dialects	04 (Nocte, Wancho, Ollo, Tangsa)
Local Dialects Audio CD’s released	06 (Nocte, Wancho, Tangsa, Mishmi, Ollo and Tutsa)
Candidates for IAS Coaching	10
Modern Office and Computer Coaching	50
Nursing	36
Other Trainings	65
APPSC Coaching	05
Exposure Programmes within and outside the country	25

Newman Educational Society (NES)

Newman Educational Society is responsible for catering to the education al needs of the people in East Arunachal Pradesh. Seeing the pressing need for education for the development of the poor population in this remote part of India, as a Priest, he began the first Christian school in East Arunachal Pradesh on 3 July, 1992 in a small village called Borduria in the undivided Tirap District. Later in the year 2002, to organise and for the effective management of all the educational activities in this area, he established NES in 2001. As of now, NES has 55 schools under its aegis.

The philosophy of the Newman Educational Society is to “kindle a flame”. True its motto, the NES always start by building a small school in every Parish church and village communities. As these small schools start functioning well, it gets converted into bigger and proper schools with all necessary facilities.

It is a matter of great joy to say that the first Bachelor Degree College was inaugurated by Hon’ble Nabam Tuki, the then Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh on 2 August, 2014. Mr. Manpoong, a retired politician and administrator, a convinced Buddhist by religion, was so appreciative of the society’s contribution towards education, that he donated 15 acres of Prime land and some buildings for the running of the College.

The diocese has a total of 75 hostels for students, ranging from Kindergarten to Bachelor Degree level. The total of number of students is 3888 of which 2142 are boys and 1746 girls. Most of these hostels are necessitated by the fact that villages are far-flung and the children cannot go to a good school without being in a hostel.

"Looking back at those days 25 years ago, in a temporary bamboo house, with no water, electricity and without anything that can call facility, with 28 small boys in the hostel and 58 in the school and the physical and mental agony that we went through, I feel it was all worth it, as we see two generations of young men and women climbing the ladder of life. It was a challenge, there were threats, elements of jealousy but faith and love helped us to surpass all those. My hats off to the people of Borduria who made it all possible" recalled Bishop George.

As of now the Diocese of Miao, which covers eight civil districts of eastern part of Arunachal Pradesh, has 55 schools, with 825 teachers, catering to the educational needs of 20,200 children in the remote corners, bordering Myanmar and China.

The NES organizes a wide range of inter-school events annually. Every school in the remote corners of the eight districts come together multiple times in a year to compete and challenge themselves. The spirit of competition apart, the children begin to experience that they are students not just of a school but a member of a large family called NES.

One of the most noteworthy-event of NES is RADIANCE, an inter-school art and sports event in which the students of all the schools under NES come together to exhibit their talents in the field of art and sports.

The Inter-school Science Exhibition, SPECTURM, is another important event of the NES. The students come up with some of the amazing experiments in science.

Number of Schools	55
Number of Students	20200
Number of Boys	11022
Number of Girls	9178
Number of Teachers	825
Gents Teachers	334
Lady Teachers	491

Schools District-wise

District	Number of Schools
Changlang District	12
Lohit District	07
Namsai District	06
Lower Dibang Valley District	06
Longding District	13
Tirap District	11
TOTAL	55

Hostel Students Data

Boys Hostel	37
Girls Hostel	38
Total Boys in the Hostels	2142
Total Girls in the Hostels	1746
Total students in the Hostels	3888