Outsiders at Home:Where next for northeasterners?

It has been a couple of weeks since northeast students Loitam Richard and Dana Sangma lost their lives due to alleged cases of racial discrimination. These deaths have sparked off major debates regarding the step-motherly attitude that Northeasterners have to face when they leave their region for other parts of their own country in search of better opportunities in education and work as well as a more peaceful and opulent environment to live in.

Facebook, that ever-handy tool of the social vigilante, provided the base for a massive movement. A group “Justice for Loitam Richard”, already has more than 2 lakh members. Petitions have been signed in large numbers demanding unbiased investigations in the two cases. Protests have taken place in various cities of India and the world. The Indian media, forever shy of covering events relating to the northeast has pitched in too.

The broad debates that these issues have flared up has exposed the misunderstanding and ignorance that most Indians breed towards those hailing from the Northeast. Just a year back, a project report on ‘North East Migration and Challenges in National Capital: City’s silent Racial attack on its own countrymen’ released by the North East Support Centre and Helpline (NESCH) revealed that 78 per cent of the North-East population in Delhi, numbering nearly two lakh, is subject to several kinds of humiliation because of their appearance. The situation isn’t drastically different in other parts of the country. So it was not surprising when the allegations of racial discrimination towards Richard and Dana were immediately brushed aside by college authorities and police as a result of persecution complex. It is indeed time for the nation to wake up to the presence of people from the northeast in “mainland India” and to make concerted efforts towards overcoming the racial and cultural divide that leads to prejudiced ideas regarding people from the region.

An Alleged Case of Discrimination Against a Northeast Indian And Role of Citizen Journalists in Social Media

On 5th April 2012, a popular group on Facebook with nearly 20,000 followers named “Stop Discriminating People From the North-East India” posted an update saying

“Last night, A student from Shillong studying at Delhi University was detained, physically and racially abused by Delhi Police near north campus. One cop abused him “Hindi me baat kar, saala Chinese” and asked if he is engaged in homosexual activities.”

The link to the same is http://tinyurl.com/87cb7kp

A preliminary search on Google returned no results regarding the said incident. A question asked regarding the reason why the student was detained in the first place remained unanswered by the administrator of the page. In the meanwhile, a series of comments started streaming in mostly from indignant northeast Indians detailing similar experiences in Delhi and other Indian cities. Another set of people started a series of inflammatory comments clamouring for revenge. A sample of this sort read “let us avenge our brother in our own turf”. While I insisted on more details, all I received was more indignation at the general level of discrimination faced by NE students studying outside their home region as well as questions on my competence to judge the update given my name. Yes, name. In the same breath, racism and homophobia of a set of policemen in Delhi was being exposed and another person was being racially profiled. It did not matter that I myself hail from Shillong and study outside the Northeast. The stock question then was whether I was a Bengali Muslim and in that case, I must be one of those illegal Bangladeshi migrants who have run over NE.

The entire episode raises a number of key questions:

1. If the student was actually detained and treated as mentioned, what actions are being taken against the policemen who are then guilty of racial profiling, homophobia as well as denying an Indian citizen the use of a language of his choice?

2. Given the same assumption, why was the student detained in the first place? And why was this information withheld?

3. What sort of role do unaccountable citizen journalists like the admin of the said page play in spreading information, especially information that is liable to incite communal tension?

Is Independence Day Just a Holiday?

Two years ago, on a wet and gloomy morning, I woke up to the sight of aTiranga ready to be unfurled at the gate of the hostel I’d recently made my home. The corner stall served the same tea, the streets wore the same look of worldly abandon, the trees still shed brown-green leaves and still, breakfast served at the mess was bad. Yet it was different for me in a very personal way, like a day that came in customised packaging. It was my first Independence Day celebrations. Ever.

For seventeen years, I had witnessed Independence Day come and go behind closed doors back in my hometown of Shillong. Terrorist groups, falling over each other to proclaim their anti-India stand, made sure that the average Northeasterner enjoyed a cosy day at home, come every 15^th August or 26^thJanuary. So it was refreshing to say the least to breathe open air this particular time.

It would not be far from the truth to say that the true significance of Independence Day is lost on the generations that haven’t actually seen or been brought up on a staple diet of stories of the freedom movement, its heroes and villains. Probably, the only ones who can still feel the true spirit of Freedom are those who are deprived of it either by political reasons, like in conflict areas of the Northeast and Kashmir, or by economic reasons of poverty and exploitative deprivation. Yet, would it be fair or proper to blame a generation for its disdain and indifference to an occasion cherished by its predecessors, simply because of its chronological position in history? I would argue, no.

It is true that 15^th August today evokes the variety of jingoism and inflated national pride that can easily be missed come Morning the 16^th. To a large extent, one can attribute this sudden outburst of patriotic fervour to a sort of automated conformism; the desire to be part of a shared experience that is larger than us. Or maybe, simply, as Sartre exclaimed in his Nausea, “Good God, how important they consider it to think the same things all together.”  And could you really blame anyone for this state of affairs? It’s human nature to flock together, even instinctively. The feeling of belonging has primal connotations of safety inherent in each one of us. Also, personally, the popular idea of Independence means little, because we have never known a day without it. Which, without being too austere on my generation and the preceding one, I suppose is alright.

Yet, Independence Day is not just a holiday. Far from it. In a nation being divided and dissected on every ground imaginable, an occasion like this comes handy to remind us of our piecemeal Oneness. Through all the jingoism, the message of nationalism and patriotism as perceived in the popular sense isn’t entirely lost on the general Indian masses. It may be agreed that the forms of expression may have changed, that fancy SMSes and Facebook statuses may be our way  of “doing our bit for the nation”. Today, the reasons which keep the nation united might be superficial, even trivial, but there can be no arguing that without them, we would be heading faster towards a breakdown of national sentiment. Independence Day may not be the kind of emotional ritual it once was to Indians but it still is a day that reminds us of the age when the diversity of the land united to dream the Midnight Dream; a day that reminds us and assures us that the dream is unfulfilled yet attainable. So even though the jingoism will disappear the next morning, a small flicker of nationalism will burn on.