North East Students’ Organisation and Congress demand protection for Northeast Indians

Guwahati: Leader of opposition in Assam assembly, Debabrata Saikia moved Union Home minister, Amit Shah complaining that in the name of COVID-19, Northeasters with Mongolid features in targeted.

In a letter to Shah, Saikia a senior congress leader stated, “I am constrained to bring to your notice the fact that at a time when our country is struggling to cope with the threat posed by the Covid-19, certain racist elements is some parts of India are targeting for abuse and vilification people with Mongoloid feature who belong from North-eastern states”.

He added, “I have already received information about several such incidents, where persons from the North-east have been abused as “Chinkis”, bat-eating tribe etc. At a shopping mall in Pune, a middle-aged woman abused a young girl from the North-east ostensibly because the culprit suspected the victim of being a Chinese national and, therefore, responsible for spreading the Corona virus. A lady named Angelica Aribam was so appallingly abused on social media that she was compelled to lodge an FIR with the Delhi Police against the culprits.

It needs to be borne in mind that this sort of abuse is not only racist, but it violates the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.”

He added, “ I would like to request you kindly to issue strict instructions to the administrations of all states and Union Territories, barring the

North-east, to take immediate and effective steps to protect domiciles from the North-east from all kinds of physical and mental harassment on the pretext of the Coronavirus. In particular, I would further like to urge you to instruct the Delhi Police to book and take appropriate action as per law against the persons responsible for harassing Angelica Aribam.”

The North East Students’ Organisation (NESO) which is an umbrella body of student union of the region condemned the recurring incidence of violence and discriminations due to physical appearance meted out to the indigenous peoples from the North Eastern states who are studying and working in different cities and parts of India .

NESO in a statement stated, “Reports of violent attacks and racial discrimination against the students and public from the region has been on the rise from various parts of mainland India after the outbreak of Covid19 pandemic.

This is the very least disheartening considering that the world at large is striving together to restrict the spread of deadly Covid19. The humiliations they had to undergo apart from the mental distress of staying away from their love and dear ones, does not augur well for the diverse country that India is”.

NESO appealed to the Central Government to put in place all necessary arrangements in order to ensure the physical and emotional wellbeing of the North East Community in various parts of the country.

NESO suggested that the respective Chief Ministers of the North eastern states actively liaise with their counterparts in various states in-order to ensure that the perpetrators of hate crimes from various parts of the country are brought to book and that future occurrences of such unwanted incidents are completely avoided.