Of Chinkies, Momos and Ching-Chong Chinaman At the centre of all the clashes
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Ironic it is, for while people from the North East region continue to get hounded and subjected to racial discrimination, the people in the region, particularly Manipur, continue to be at loggerheads with each other. On February 20, three women from Arunachal Pradesh were subjected to racial slur, humiliation and intimidation by their neighbours at Delhi, followed quickly by the sexual harassment meted out to a woman from Nagaland at Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh in the evening of February 22. The racial slur, intimidation of the three Arunachali women went viral on the social media and even as the wound from the hurt and discrimination were yet to die down, news of yet another woman from the North East, this time a girl from Nagaland, being stalked and sexually molested emerged. Delhi police responded rather swiftly and even as this commentary is being penned down came the news that the people responsible for verbally assaulting the Arunachali women have been arrested. Not the first time that people from the North East have been subjected to such discrimination in other parts of the country, particularly in Delhi and the other metros and to many of the mainlanders the people from the North East are just Momos, Chinkies, Bahadurs, Ching-Chong Chinaman and more recently Corona and all the terms that one can associate with the physical Mongoloid features of the North Eastern people. The people of the North East are not hairy or smelly like many of the people in mainland India and this is obviously what sets them apart from the others, and it is from this difference that the racial discrimination arises. Recall Richard Loitam, Nido Tania, Reingamphi Awungshi and the list can go on and it is with a reason why Delhi Police has a special cell for the North East people. One wonders how effectively the recommendations of the Bezbaruah Committee report has been adopted by the Government of India and how effectively the adopted recommendations have been implemented and this question has been raised in the backdrop of the fact that even after the Bezbaruah Committee report, hate crimes and racial discrimination against the North East people continue unabated in different parts of the country, particularly in Delhi. The call to the BJP led Government at Delhi is, before the brags and pouring accolades on the North East region, start by giving a new meaning to the understanding of the Act East Policy. The Act East Policy should be much more than just geo-politics or looking beyond the border of the North East towards South East Asia, but entails looking at the reality in the North East and taking North East into the consciousness of the ‘mainlanders’. This is what would give more meaning and substance to the Act East Policy.
So even as the people from the North East, regardless from which State one comes from, regardless of which ethnicity, continue to face discrimination, harassment and even deaths just on the basis of how they look in other parts of the country, people of the same region continue to be at loggerheads, particularly in Manipur. Kuki, as a community is the common denominator that runs through all the ethnic clashes that one sees in Manipur and in the North East region. Even as Meitei-Kuki clash is fast approaching the three year mark, Kukis as a community was again in the thick of things in the recent clash at Litan and in neighbouring Nagaland with the Angamis. And it has been like this for decades. Go back to the 1990s and one can still recall the Naga-Kuki clash that started in 1992 and went on till 1997. The Kuki-Paite clash that stretched for over a year from 1997 to 1998, claiming hundreds of human lives, with hundreds displaced. Like during the Naga-Kuki clash from 1992 to 1997, Imphal was the refuge of the displaced Kukis during the clash with the Paites. Again in the early part of the 2000s, one can still recall the Kuki-Dimasa clash in 2004 that led to the deaths of over 45 people, the Kuki-Karbi clash in neighbouring Assam and the list continues if one goes back some decades. So if the people of North East continue to face racial profiling and discrimination in other parts of the country, there is one community which has been in a state of war with others in the North East region. The irony of the situation is not lost on anyone.
So even as the people from the North East, regardless from which State one comes from, regardless of which ethnicity, continue to face discrimination, harassment and even deaths just on the basis of how they look in other parts of the country, people of the same region continue to be at loggerheads, particularly in Manipur. Kuki, as a community is the common denominator that runs through all the ethnic clashes that one sees in Manipur and in the North East region. Even as Meitei-Kuki clash is fast approaching the three year mark, Kukis as a community was again in the thick of things in the recent clash at Litan and in neighbouring Nagaland with the Angamis. And it has been like this for decades. Go back to the 1990s and one can still recall the Naga-Kuki clash that started in 1992 and went on till 1997. The Kuki-Paite clash that stretched for over a year from 1997 to 1998, claiming hundreds of human lives, with hundreds displaced. Like during the Naga-Kuki clash from 1992 to 1997, Imphal was the refuge of the displaced Kukis during the clash with the Paites. Again in the early part of the 2000s, one can still recall the Kuki-Dimasa clash in 2004 that led to the deaths of over 45 people, the Kuki-Karbi clash in neighbouring Assam and the list continues if one goes back some decades. So if the people of North East continue to face racial profiling and discrimination in other parts of the country, there is one community which has been in a state of war with others in the North East region. The irony of the situation is not lost on anyone.