North East Racial Attack, Can It Be STOPPED?
Madhu Chandra *
Protest against Racism at Saket Area, Delhi for stabbed 22 Years Old Manipuri boy on Feb 11 2014 :: Pix - MSAD
Utterly shocked and indeed panic at the unprecedented hate crimes
against the people from North East India in Delhi and now in other
mega cities of India. A man from Manipur brutally attacked for not
able to speak Kannada in Bangalore on 16 October, two other men from
Nagaland attacked in Gurgaon on 17 October – threatening the entire
North East people to leave Gurgaon and a young from Mizoram murdered
in South Delhi on 17 October. These attacks are the unprecedented hate
crimes against North East people for last almost a decade in Delhi and
National Capital Region (NCR).
The racial hate crimes on North East people began with sexual target
to women from the region in and around 2005 in Delhi and NCR. A very
few likeminded social activists, academicians, and lawyers were
compelled to establish North East Support Centre & Helpline in 2007 to
provide on spot assistance to the people from the region with the
patronage of well noted personalities like Dr. John Dayal, member of
National Integration Council and Dr. Udit Raj - standing MP, who also
holds the National Chairmanship of All India Confederation of SC/ST
Organisations.
Sleepless nights received the calls from youth men and women who have
been targeted endlessly, some sexually abused by the landlords, office
managers, institutional staff, some terminated from their jobs without
any given reasons, salaries were held up for months etc. The North
East Support Centre & Helpline team was panic that the racial nature
of hate crimes will go out of control and possibly spread to other
mega cities of India. That is exactly happening now.
North East Support Centre & Helpline team conducted pilot research
project to highlight the plights faced by the people from the region
so that the concerned Central and state governments could adopt the
policy, law and plan of action to curb the racial hate crime at early
stage.
First study conducted in 2008 revealed that 50% of sexual crime in
Delhi and NCR were targeted to the women from North East India
according the media clips of first six months of the year. The study
predicted that if the government machineries fail to stop the sexual
harassment meted to the women from North East region, will spread to
any women in Delhi and NCR. This happened exactly. Delhi has become a
rape national capital, where every 14 hour a woman is raped and every
18 hours sexually assaulted in Delhi and NCR. While the women from
North East India continue to face the sexual harassment in Delhi and
NCR, the racial attack on men and women from the region took place
simultaneously.
Second research under the banner of Social Profiling of North East
People conducted in 2009 revealed that 86% of North East people living
in Delhi faced racial discrimination in India national capital. The
Social Profiling against the North East people was the single root
cause of sexual harassment and racial hate crimes in Delhi and NCR.
North East people were considered a polluting people to the mainland
societies, never considered as citizens of India, treated as strangers
in own country and called cheap people. This mind set is not only
found among the general public, but very much to Delhi and Gurgaon
police, lawyers, judges and politicians.
Third study under the title “North East Migration and Challenges in
Mega Cities of India” in 2010, which was released on International
Women Day on March 8, 2011. The study was conducted to find out the
challenge in North East region and reasons for migrating to the Delhi
and other cities.
The major push factor of the migration was the lack of higher
educational infrastructure in the region. After having managed to
study up to the 12th standard in mostly private run schools, the most
students are pushed to other cities in India in search of better
education. Government run colleges in the region were hardly the
choice of the students as they did not have needed branches of
studies. According to the North East Council’s 2020 Vision, less than
5% of the students in the region choose government run colleges after
passing the 12th standard.
The challenge of setting up the higher educational infrastructure in
the region has been unmet and no initiative under taken from neither
from the Union nor state governments. More will migrate and the
challenges of sexual harassment and racial nature of hate crimes to
the women and men from the region will continue.
What is the Next Step to STOP the Hate Crimes?
Having founded the North East Support Centre & Helpline and led the
campaign against the sexual harassment and racial attack on women and
men, particularly from the North East region, there is no easy answer
and short cut to stop the unprecedented hate crimes. As the father of
only one daughter, studying in Delhi trembles my heart with fear that
this terror of hate crimes and sexual attack could be to anyone out
there. With this fear and trembling, I put forward the following
opinion, if these could be anywhere helpful to those in frontline,
tackling the challenges.
Union, Delhi, and Neighbouring State Governments’ Mandate:
The mindset of the people of Delhi and NCR is the root cause of the
sexual harassment and racial hate crimes against the people from the
North East region. Until and unless the mindset of the people changed,
the hate crimes will not stop! To change the people’s mindset, there
has been terrible game of throwing ball to one another’s court between
Union, Delhi and Haryana governments. There has been a tokenism
attitude from the previous Union government, when Delhi remains
incapable and Haryana and Uttra Pradesh governments unwilling.
For any attempt to stop the hate crimes, reactive way of dealing will
not bring any long lasting or permanent solution. The Union and Delhi
Government has been dealing in reactive mode all these years. They
remember when a crime takes place, and then forget until next crime
arises. So is the same with police machineries.
A proactive mode of dealing the issue might help in preventing crimes.
What has the government – Union, Delhi and Neighbouring States, done
in bring mass education to change the mindset of the people? Union
government must seek the help from the stakeholders in attempting to
bring the mindset changed.
There has been denial consistently that the crimes meted to the people
from North East region are the nature of racial hate crimes. Until and
unless accept the reality of the racial nature of hate crimes, which
is faced by the people of the region, perhaps any attempt to stop will
be in vain.
The Law Enforcing Machineries:
There are serious lapses from Delhi and Haryana police machineries in
tackling the hate crimes. They have taken the steps like introducing
the 9 points guidelines to BPOs, setting up Delhi Police Nodal Office
for North East people with Helpline services, and introducing new law
to book the culprits of racial hate crime under the Prevention of
SC/ST Atrocity Act.
Whenever a hate crime or sexual assault takes place in Delhi or
Gurgaon against the people from North East India, the attitude of
Delhi and Haryana police are most disgusting. They will not pay any
attention, ignore, refuse, and delay. With much pressure, particularly
from media and their top officials will act unwillingly. In 2009,
Gurgaon police arrested a rapist after the victim has been running
from post to post. Instead of locking the rapist behind the bars, he
was offered to sleep on the bed reserved from police officers on duty.
Soon the man was bailed out and walked free without justice to the
victim. The news of letting the culprits to walk freely after
committing crimes, encourages the perpetrators that they can commit
crimes and can walk free easily.
There has also been a matter concern in dealing to change the mindset
of the people from the way how justice is administered in different
courts. The defending lawyer attacked the victims and victims’ lawyers
in the court’s premises. Judges denied justice to the victims by
allowing the defending lawyers knives with prosecutors for hostiles of
witnesses. At one point, a judge in Gurgaon court mocked at a rape
victim that women from North East sleep with others and go to court
for financial gains. The way of rending justice to the victim and
culprits will not help any effort attempting to change the mindset of
the people. This must be corrected.
The Stakeholders and Solidarities:
The successful endeavours of North East Support Centre & Helpline were
mainly because of the stakeholders and individual solidarities. There
is a need for more stakeholders and individual solidarities to help in
dealing with the challenges.
Few of the stakeholders when North East Support Centre & Helpline
began were All India Christian Council, which deals with the caste and
religious based human rights violation, and All India Confederation of
SC/ST Organisations, All India Catholic Union, United Christian
Action, and North East Students’ United Forum Delhi. Both print and
electronic media gave enormous support, when some did much damaging.
Individual solidarity is very important. We had individuals as
mentioned earlier, like Dr. John Dayal, who is also Secretary General
of All India Christian Council, Dr. Udit Raj – standing MP, Mr. Anil
Chamadia – Dalit activist and Journalist, and others.
More stakeholders and individual solidarities are indeed needed
because the challenges is much bigger that the capability of handling
ourselves. The hate crime against the people from North East India is
going to be the issue beyond Delhi and NCR. Without the stakeholders
and individual solidarities from other communities in the cities and
states where our people are going to face the challenges, we will not
be able to deal with.
Collective National Approach:
Time has come now to think beyond Delhi and the challenges of racial
hate crime spreading to other mega cities in India. Here come the need
of collective effort, seeking the stakeholders like the North East
India student bodies, human rights groups and church groups in mega
cities. I include church groups because most of the Christian
communities from North East India have their church groups in mega
cities. They are very important stakeholders to render service to
their own people in the time of need.
There has been a major concern about dealing collectively. Our young
men and women are vulnerable irrespective of their neither home state
nor tribe or caste identity. They are targeted without differentiating
their identities but the way responded has been mostly on the basis of
one’s tribal or state. This has been one of the most challenging tasks
and so it will be when we think nationally.
A national conclave of all North East student bodies in mega cities if
state governments could facilitate, could be good to begin with.
Otherwise, the officials of all students’ bodies in mega cities,
representing the North Eastern states, can think of coming to one
common platform to begin talk about it.
A Word must be said on the Manner of Demanding ILP in Manipur:
I have held my breath until now, though wanted to express few thoughts
many a time. The concern for protecting the land and the culture of
the state by its people and demanding Inner Land Permit is the
fundamental rights of every citizen.
What concerns me the most is the manner in which the demand has been
carried out? Because the manner the people of Manipur adopts either in
good shape or bad will impact on the lives of all North East people in
Delhi and other mega cities.
Student wings and other bodies raiding the Hindi speaking people
living the rented house in Imphal and other places to find out their
identities and people without proper identify proof were asked to
leave the state etc are form of undemocratic approach. They should not
take the law into their hand. Their concern of identifying the
migrants should be appealed to the government and to the law enforcing
agencies, never by themselves.
The incident like in the complex of National Institute of Technology
at Lamphel in September will only make hard life to our young men and
women migrated to mega cities in search of better education and their
careers.
In the process of demanding Inner Land Permit, what about demanding
the state government to introduce law, policy and plan of act like
some them in Delhi. In Delhi, any tenant taking the house one rent
need to fulfil certain requirements. First, Rent Agreement for eleven
months between the landlord and tenant registered in magistrate office
with one witness each for landlord and tenant with on spot photo
graphs. Normal notary agreement is not valid in Delhi. Second, police
verification of the tenant, which is done by the landlord with proper
identify proof by filling the prescribed forms made available at
police stations. So is also applied to family desiring to keep the
servant or domestic helper in their home. This could be helpful while
dealing with the concerns of the migrants, particularly the illegal
migrants from Bangladesh.
* Madhu Chandra wrote this article for e-pao.net
Madhu Chandra is the Founding Member and Former Spokesperson of North East Support Centre & Helpline currently stationed at Kakching (Manipur) after rendering service at various capacities at Delhi and other mega cities of India.
The writer can be reached at madhuchandra66(at)gmail(dot)com
This article was posted on October 19, 2014.
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