Tackling Racism: Matter of resource allocation & communication
- proper with relation-building -

Ningthoujam Suraj *

Jamia Students protesting against discrimination towards NE students on 28 October 2009 :: Pix - Ibomacha oinam

Racism is a sensitive issue & its perpetrators knowingly or unknowingly tend to base it on an emotional train of thought. Looking into the reason for this lack of objectivity & sentimental nature, it is somewhat clarified by the fact that almost all forms of racism arises from a psychological complex - either a superiority complex or an inferiority complex.

A person from a majority community naturally feels superior & comfortable in relation to his minority counterpart. We have to understand what the cause for this superiority illusion is. Simple majority of numbers is not the answer, take the case of medieval India's "minority" Muslim population ruling over "majority' Hindus where the Muslims felt superior or the British era where even though being more in number, the "Majority" Indians felt inferior instead & they tried to compensate this complex by referring to India's glorious past & this is why the terms "Minority" & "Majority" is a misnomer while discussing racism, yet I will continue to use them in the passage for want of better terms.

I believe the answer is with whoever controls the resources. Since times immemorial, it is those with the greatest resources -whether human, technology, natural resources, etc, that has stayed at the top & developed this superiority illusion. The community with less resource has no option but to depend on the resourceful neighbor as it cannot stay in isolation unless it wants to become a frog in a well.

The one with abundant resources takes advantage of this dependence & starts bullying the "minority" into accepting its terms & conditions & adds occasional insults to add some flavor.

Now why are some communities rich & others poor in resources? We have to ask history which would implicitly mean asking how Europe & America prospered while India, Asian & African nations fell behind. Nobody in their right mind would deny the immoral manner in which Americans acquired huge resources while Europe, the birthplace of Renaissance, Reformation, liberal ideas like Democracy, Human Rights, Republic and most importantly the Industrial Revolution, had an opportune chance during the 17th to 19th centuries to develop its resources. Asian & African countries were meanwhile embroiled in internal conflicts, some of which are continuing even today where they could not find an opportunity to consolidate & organize its available resource to maximize it.

This favorable political situation came to Europe first and then America, now the opportunity is developing in more countries than ever. Presently, India & China has this atmosphere wherein development of resource comes relatively easy. And as our resources increase, other countries get curious about us & we will first be tolerated, then depended upon & ultimately we will start feeling superior. It was so not the case in the last century wherein Mahatma Gandhi in a racial abuse incident was thrown off a train in South Africa.

Now, Apartheid has ended in the 1990's & the train you are travelling by might just be owned by a company headed by an Indian or for that matter a Chinese. So, racial tolerance by others comes with appropriation of significant amount of resources by you. The Japanese, considered to be a bright race was considered a stubborn & isolation loving community until they entered the industrial world & their racial abuse at the hands of the Americans were heard no more.

India, a land where racism has been acknowledged to exist by MPs recently, has surprisingly great respect for Japanese. Why? They have resources & their contributions materialized many projects like the Maruti car or the Delhi Metro Rail system. An auto rickshaw driver in Delhi once asked me if I was from Japan & gave me his valuable insight on different Asian races saying Japanese race was the brightest (of course, since India has good, friendly & a profitable relation with Japan) while a hesitant opinion about China as India lost a war to it & is constantly threatened by its economic & military clout.

Indians have learnt to hate China because the concept of China is threatening & implies a loss to themselves as they see it as a rival against which they have to compete (Pakistan is our rival only in cricket & that also seems to be exciting less & less in recent times) So, In the NE migrants they see an image of China & feel the need to do something about it. You may ask what of the young street hoodlums who taunt NE's with the "Ch" word even though they know little of India's war with China & the rivalry.

It is the middle class that is to blame. The middle class in India is huge. What they say makes a difference. Earlier, they used to hate South Indians calling all of them madrasis, now they have learnt to mix with them simply because South Indians have moved up the resource ladder with excellent education, respectable jobs etc. So now the middle class Cannon is aimed at the next in line, the NE's.

What the middle class has to say trickles down to the lower class & they pick up false notions about china & the NE population (note here that the middle class considers Japanese as more positive than Chinese-because many Indians are working in Japanese firms & Japanese FDIs are huge, so Japanese-favoring ideas percolates down to lower levels too) .

And this effects the saying "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing". In this case a little knowledge of NE causes dangerous things to happen to NE migrants. Little knowledge thus perpetuates the concept of NE as a place with no educational institutions full of easy females & of course, with no appreciable resource, whatsoever. In short a decadent unorganized hopeless society. Nothing could be far from the truth. A simple evidence of how women are treated in the NE vis-à-vis North India will highlight who is culturally superior in this aspect.

India's opinion of itself compared to China is more of an inferiority complex filled with caution rather than a superior or an equal. Inferiority complex from the end with low resources tends to be even more dangerous. This fixation of India regarding China does impact India-NE Relation in many ways. The NE people being mistaken for Chinese deliberately or otherwise, implants a sense of alienation among NE's. As a result, they cower back into a nutshell & do not venture outside of their own community.

There is absolutely no visible relation between an "Indian" & an NE. And this again (just like the Indians picking up false assumptions or notions about NE) leads to NE developing false image of an "Indian"- moustache, dark skin, culturally & traditionally narrow-minded, scratches body in public etc. This is wrong. I have met "Indians" who are more broad-minded than NE's & at the same time shared views with NE's who do not want to mix with "Indians" based on ill-informed notions that "Indians" are uncool & unpresentable & quite uncivil.

Just like the Indo-China relation, we have NE-India relation wherein NE feels threatened by India & the mere mention of India is a cause of anxiety. NE views itself inferior in relation with India and why. India has resources while NE has less of it & is dependant. So, tackling of racism has to consider economic & social aspects, all of which are affected by the resource available at command.

Who has more, gets respected more-whether it be material resource, or moral or spiritual. Sadly, that's the way the world works. And through building of resources, NE can lessen its dependence on the central union of India thereby developing self-respect, shedding its inferiority complex, sending a continuous message to "Indians" of our lessening dependence on them to increase their respect, thus impacting the racism equation positively.

We have to build our Human resource education through excellent education firstly, our work culture by fighting corruption, our industrial & agricultural sector through excellent planning & follow-up with hard work. If the Gov. of India is also serious about NE integration, they have to understand that NE needs to develop its resources & they must provide necessary help for this. Simply giving 3000-4000 crores annually won't do. They must know that this money is only helping integrate the MLAs & MPs of Manipur with India, not the common man or the student as the 3000-4000 crores isn't reaching them.

Thus racial tolerance is a step-by-step process & won't get provisioned overnight. The sure-shot guarantee to ensure Manipuris get the respect due to them is by enabling the common man/student to be resourceful & for the "Indians" to know this. And this process starts with proper communication & relation-building. To explain the importance of communication; let me put a final analysis of Communication options available to the supposed "Majority" & "Minority" communities.

The Superiority-complex inflicted individual may or may not wish to explicitly express his feeling of superiority in public. If he chooses to express, the way he expresses the difference between him & the "minority" could be- to genuinely exchange ideas in a healthy curious relationship or it could be to stamp his superiority in all imaginable spheres over the "minority" without any interest in what the "minority" has to offer & to mock him for that.

So the "majority" has four options here:-
a) He is indifferent to other races & doesn't feel the need to communicate with them
b) He notices & is curious but do not care enough to communicate & establish relationship
c) He communicates & seeks a healthy frank relationship without condescending aspects
d) He communicates openly of his superiority with an aim to mock the "minority"

Which of these attitudes should the "minority" encourage? It is for everyone to decide for himself.

But as far as I have seen, in general, the "minority" is satisfied with the first & second option. Live & let live with no interference. Be happy in your own world, I'll be happy in mine. Is this attitude going to bring any positive change?

In the third option, the "minority" usually feels insecure & uncomfortable either due to language barrier, a pre-conceived deep mistrust for the "majority" etc. But it signals a long-term investment in integration through understanding of each other's culture. But the barriers of language & trust are not so easy to cross.

Finally, it is the fourth option, that the "minority" starts screaming, "I AM A VICTIM OF RACISM". How many "majority" indulged in the first option or the second? How many showed option-c & what is the proportion of "Indians" involved in the fourth. If the percentage is divided, how can one say all Indians are racist? The truth is some proportions are definitely racist; you must identify them & give proper encouragement to them to take either option 1 or 2 or 3 as per your desire. For me I would encourage option -C.

For the "Minority" from the above, option (a) and (d) is not available as he can't afford to be indifferent to the way the world of the "majority" works & cannot openly mock the majority (though he may do it within his community but that does not constitute a type of communication between the two communities).
a) He notices & is curious but do not care enough to communicate & establish relationship
b) He communicates & seeks a healthy frank relationship without condescending aspects

Which of these "minority" attitudes should the majority encourage?
I hope you have the answer.

Emotional motivations must be kept to a minimum while crying for Justice against Racism. Be objective, ask yourself how many "Majority" or "Indians" have you ever tried to befriend? If the answer is zero, you may be a racist yourself.

Racism is manifestation of an emotional inferiority or superiority & the need to confirm or impress it upon its selected victim. This Psychological complex arises from the level of control over resources you have or don't. Build up the resources & you take care of racism-this must be the long term strategy to tackle racism. The short term strategy is communication-proper and relation-building for only when you call them to have lunch with you will they discuss with you, dietary habits & hopefully both of you will develop a sense of humor that you eat smelly foods & they eat chapattis.

I recommend the Stand-up comedian Russell peters for those wishing to develop a sense of humor about race differences. Look for him on YouTube.

The latest news on Ministry of Home Affairs asking officials to book users of the "Ch" word as well as other racist behavior under Scheduled Caste & Scheduled tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act is a penal regulation & post-offence arrangement. Nevertheless the proposition of a police ignoring NE racism complaints spending 6 months minimum in jail & the offender, 5 year jail without anticipatory bail & arrest without warrant is very preventive indeed. It is but for only SC/ST communities. Will it be applicable for NE persons from general communities too? To improve on this, please set-up pre-offence preventive measures (through communication-proper & relation-building).

Either 2013-2014 could be declared a national "NE Integration Year" to develop community programs like NE Melas on a Community level, inviting NE students to family & community functions, festivals etc as well as NE student groups inviting Community doctors, engineers or landlords etc to any NE event or just a simple lunch etc. At the state & national level furtherance of Look East policy, assistance in training for NE Big, Middle & Small enterprises, twist in the school & university curriculum to inculcate basic foundation knowledge about NE.

This list could be lengthened with open suggestions from the public- what the NE would like the "majority" to know & what the "majority" would like to know about NE, which sphere/sector/activities they can work together in etc. The youth especially must be targeted for they are the future of India & we do not want a racist India in the future as well.

Youths of both communities must participate in community activities. Police stations & hospitals & public service outlets must hold an annual "get-to-know-NE" function inviting NE's from their jurisdiction to build relations to foster trust. Any number of the above suggestions won't work without political & executive will. Arun Jaitly & others discussing NE discrimination in parliament as well as unity of NE protestors in the Richard Case is noteworthy in the fight against racism, but I hope they would suggest practical moves.

The race to the President seat includes Sangma from NE which if won by him, could instill a sense of respect among educated Indians for NE, but won't make much difference to the common class with who only direct interaction will help tackle racism.

Graham Greene has said - What we do not understand, we fear & what we fear, we automatically learn to hate.

And because of this missing link of knowledge about each other, the "Indians" & NE's are apprehensive of each other. Both communities continue thinking in terms of the immediate neighborhood & nothing else. Break out of the shell & befriend.

Finally, let it not be forgotten that the greatest racist of them all- Hitler, had a not so glorious end!!