Showing posts with label Northeast. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Northeast. Show all posts
04 March 2015

Delhi Worst City To Live in For Northeast People

New Delhi, Mar 4 :  At least 29 cases have been registered by people belonging to the Northeast living in the National Capital in the first two months of the year, even as Delhi has emerged as the worst city for the people hailing from the region to live in, as the year 2014 saw registration of 286 such cases.

Last year was particularly worse for the North Easterners as criminal incidents targeting them have witnessed over 200 per cent growth. In 2013 only 72 cases were registered and the year before that 55 such cases were registered by the police. However, the number of such cases was relatively low in metros like Bengaluru and neighbouring Gurgaon.

“In order to contain recurrence of such incidents, the government has directed the security infrastructure to take stringent measures,” said Minister of State for Home Affairs, Kiren Rijiju in reply to a Lok Sabha question.
03 March 2015

Vistara to begin operations to Northeast from April 2

Vistara to begin operations to Northeast from April

Vistara, the Tata-Singapore Airlines joint venture carrier, on Tuesday announced plans to launch services from April to Guwahati and Bagdogra in the Northeast, targeting more high-density traffic airports in the country.

The announcement comes close on the heels of the private airline entering south-India with the launch of air services to Hyderabad from the national capital.

 
 
The latest full-service airline, after state-run Air India and private carrier Jet Airways, Vistara currently operates across five domestic airports - New Delhi, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Goa and Hyderabad, which are all high-density traffic airports for one reason or the other.

Vistara will operate daily services from April 2 connecting Delhi with Guwahati and Bagdogra, the airline said in a release on Tuesday. After a brief stop-over at Guwahati, the flight will proceed to Bagdogra, a gateway airport to several tourist destinations in the Northeast, the airline said.

"The addition of this route reaffirms our commitment to promote regional connectivity. We are very happy to expand our operations to both Guhawati and Bagdogra," the release quoted Vistara chief executive, Phee Teik Yeoh, as saying.

The Tata-Singapore Airlines joint venture launched its services on January 9 2015 with flight services to Mumbai and Ahmedabad from its base in the national capital. The airline currently has five Airbus A320 planes in its fleet and plans to induct one more by April.

Vistara, which has 51 per cent holding of the Tata Group with the rest lying with Singapore Airlines, also plans to fly international. However, the current regulations allow only those domestic carriers to fly abroad which have completed five years of local operations and have a fleet of 20 aircraft.

The government, while proposing to do away with this rule, has sought to link overseas operations with a policy on mandatory operations on regional and remote routes. While Vistara along with new budget airline AirAsia India wants the government to do away with such norms, the established players are opposing any such move on the grounds that domestic connectivity would suffer if the norms were abolished.

If the rules are done away with, an airline, after becoming eligible for flying overseas markets, will deploy a larger part of its capacity on the international and trunk domestic routes, leaving the regional connectivity to suffer, Federation of Indian Airlines had recently said in its submission to the Civil Aviation Ministry.

These (proposed) guideline will have a devastating effect on the growth and development of emerging India, the state governments and the aviation industry, it had said.
02 March 2015

Shortage of Funds Could Hit India-Bangladesh Rail Project: Tripura Minister

Shortage of Funds Could Hit India-Bangladesh Rail Project: Tripura Minister

Agartala, Mar 2 :  The India-Bangladesh railway project to connect the North East with Bangladesh will be further delayed as no funds were allocated for acquisition of land to extend the tracks in the Railway Budget, a state minister said today.

"We had been long demanding for early completion of the 15-km long railway track to connect Agartala with Akhaura in Bangladesh, so that people of this land locked state can travel through the neighbouring country.

"But, no funds were allocated for acquisition of land in the Rail Budget. The ongoing project will be further delayed," Tripura Transport Minister Manik Dey said in his reaction to the budget.

He said the initial project cost was Rs. 271 crore and in addition acquisition was pending for 100 acres of land on both sides, which would require Rs. 302 crore.

Of the 15 km railway line, five km of tracks was in the Indian side and the remaining in Bangladesh, the minister said adding, it was an important connectivity to boost economy of the region and create a passage for the people with the rest of the country.

Agartala is about 1,700 km from Kolkata if travelled through the Chicken's Neck, a narrow strip connecting the northeastern states to the rest of India, which would be reduced to 350 km if travelled through Bangladesh.

Northeast Studies Find Space in DU Curriculum Map

By Shreya Roy Chowdhury

New Delhi, Mar 2 : A Northeast Studies Programme (NEISP) has been approved by the council of the department of sociology, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi.

The proposal for a full-fledged course is yet to be placed before DU's academic council but an initial project - a "think tank" bringing together academics, administrators and police - will be launched on March 12.

"Since 2011, I have been conducting surveys on certain key issues in Delhi," Kamei Aphun of department of sociology said. "Some of these are that the academic curriculum doesn't talk about the northeast, inefficiency and ineffectiveness of the law and order apparatus in the face of discrimination and hate, improper guidelines and policies of the government and the role of the media. Then I figured out that it is best to bring all the representatives on one forum."

NEISP will first exist as a "think tank" featuring academics from JNU, JMI, North Eastern Hill University (NEHU), Tata Institute of Social Sciences (Guwahati), media professionals, Delhi Police and representatives from the DONER (Development of North Eastern Region) ministry and NEC (North Eastern Council).

"I have prepared a vision statement with seven points," Aphun said. "These include "northeast India today", "state, ethnicity and tribes", "dams, movements and violence", "education, church and civil society", "insurgency, counter-insurgency and gun-culture", "social problems such as youth unrest, drug addiction, HIV/AIDS, alcoholism and development", "environment, culture and polity" and "government policies/programmes and problems of implementation".
26 February 2015

Boys Rescued at Train Station

14 Reang children from Tripura & 4 from Assam stopped
Some of the boys at Guwahati station on Wednesday. Picture by UB Photos
Guwahati, Feb 26 : Eighteen children from Reang refugee camps in Tripura and Assam's Hailakandi district were stopped by a joint team of Assam CID and Childline here while being taken to an ashram in Himachal Pradesh today.

Police said they stopped the boys, aged between six and 15 years, and three persons at Guwahati railway station. Trafficking rackets earlier took out many children from the region, so police are scrutinising their documents to ascertain if these boys were also being taken out illegally. One of the boys is visually impaired.

Based on a call to Childline's helpline number (1098), the joint team stopped them and brought them to a shelter home. "The three persons accompanying them told us that they were taking the children for religious and educational purposes. We are verifying whether they were being taken without the consent of their parents," superintendent of police, Assam CID, Violet Baruah, told The Telegraph .

Childline officials said they suspected it to be a child trafficking case as 14 of them are from Reang refugee camps in North Tripura. "Children from violence-affected areas in the Northeast were earlier rescued from trafficking rackets. These children are vulnerable groups as they are living in relief camps for years," coordinator of Childline, Guwahati, Nirmal Deka, said. "We are trying to speak to the children but they only speak their mother tongue," he said.

The other four boys hail from Hailakandi district in Barak Valley in Assam and speak Bengali.
Over 30,000 Reang or Bru refugees have been living in at least six camps in North Tripura district for more than 17 years.

Altogether 35,326 Reangs from neighbouring Mizoram had fled their homes in October 1997 following largescale violence there.

Displaced people comprise one of the most vulnerable targets for traffickers. Children, including minor girls from areas affected by ethnic violence in parts of the Northeast, have been rescued from states like Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and cities like Mumbai and Delhi. "Their parents may have been lured with the promise of good education in the ashram. As they are struggling for survival in the relief camps for years, their parents may have agreed," said a CID official.

Both the Centre and Tripura government have been trying to repatriate the Reangs to Mizoram but many refused to return fearing further violence. Their security concerns increased following fresh ethnic violence in Reang-dominated areas in Mizoram in 2009. They have also been complaining that the amount announced for their rehabilitation was insufficient.

Union home minister Rajnath Singh, during his visit to Tripura on February 13, met representatives of Reang refugees and Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar to expedite their repatriation. Singh appealed to the Mizoram government to ensure their security in Mizoram.
25 February 2015

FCI To Engage Private Players For Procurement in The Northeast India

States in the region told to prepare road map to take a final call, sustainable policy support needed to make operation viable
By Dilip Kumar Jha

Mumbai, Feb 25 : Faced with insufficient storage facility, the government might engage private warehouses for foodgrains procurement in north-eastern states either independently or on behalf of state agencies.

Acting on the recommendations of the high-level committee (HLC) of the Food Corporation of India (FCI), chairman C Viswanath convened a meeting of state secretaries of the north-eastern states and a couple of private players in the warehousing sector on February 17. In the meeting, they were asked to draw a road map on how to reach out to farmers for foodgrain procurement to prevent distress sale. The state governments are to give their plan to FCI by Wednesday.

According to sources, state secretaries were convinced enough on the need to engage private warehouses to commence minimum support price (MSP) operations (to buy foodgrains at MSP), considering the inadequate storage facility of FCI and state governments in the region, which produces 40 per cent of India’s foodgrains. Private players also presented their plans.

“West Bengal would welcome private players to increase the reach of benefits of MSP to the small and marginal farmers,” said state principal secretary (food), Anil Verma.


Most large farmers in the north-eastern regions, including a part of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, and Odisha execute distress sale at the time of harvesting foodgrains, resulting into the middlemen building stocks when prices are low to sell on highs, thus, creating price arbitrage.

“We have some instances of distress sell in this region. However, agriculture being a state subject, the onus lies with the state governments to engage private-sector warehouses to start MSP operations on their behalf. We do not have any problem if state governments engage private players. In case private players are engaged, they will be allowed only for procurement. Transportation and distribution to the public distribution system will be controlled by respective states,” said an FCI official.

Since FCI does not have adequate storage facility, the public-sector foodgrains procurement agency does not execute any MSP operations on its own, thereby leaving no options for farmers to sell their produce. Only one crop is grown in most fields in the region due to lack of irrigation system against three crops in other agriculture-centric states. Hence, the region holds immense potential for further growth in foodgrains.

“The eastern states have a huge potential for procurement of foodgrains. That is one region that can trigger a second green revolution,” said former Agricultural Costs and Prices head Ashok Gulati, a member of the HLC formed in August last year to resolve its functional inefficiencies.

Private-sector warehouses have been active in this region for the past several years, holding massive stocks of foodgrains on behalf of their corporate or bank clients. They have proved to be cost-efficient, too.

“We suggested that the private sector could work as an agent of FCI without compromising on providing MSP to the farmers and preserving the quality of the grain. We have emphasised on the need to identify and select only credible private-sector players who would agree to make payments to farmers on account payee cheques /online transfer and who have good corporate governance practices and past experience. The agency should be selected geography-wise in a competitive transparent framework. This can cut down transport costs, provide MSP to farmers in the unserved areas and introduce efficiencies along the entire food value chain. In the poorly-served states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam and Jharkhand, private-sector warehouses can play a very important role,” said Sanjay Kaul, managing director and chief executive officer, National Collateral Management Services.

For sustainable procurement, however, the government should draw a long-term road map and allow private players at least for four years to make operation viable, Kaul noted.

MUTUAL BENEFITS
  • The north-eastern region produces 40 per cent of India’s foodgrains
     
  • The FCI and the state governments are faced with inadequate storage facility there
     
  • To tackle this insufficiency, government might engage private warehouses for foodgrains procurement, either independently or on behalf of state agencies
     
  • Most farmers in the north-eastern regions execute distress sale at the time of harvesting foodgrains
     
  • This results in the middlemen building stocks when prices are low to sell on highs, thus, creating price arbitrage
     
  • FCI conducted a meeting with state secretaries and private players and asked them to draw a road map on how to reach out to farmers for foodgrain procurement to prevent them from distress sale
23 February 2015

Law for race crimes in India: What does it look like?

Minister of state for Home, Kiren Rijiju reiterated what Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on a law specific to race crimes in India.

Rijiju assured that there would be a specific law in place against race crimes and this would ensure that the punishment too becomes more stringent.

Race crime Law: What does it look like?
The proposal is to add sections into the Indian Penal Code and also amend the Code of Criminal Procedure. The inclusion and amendment would be necessary to make race crimes more specific in nature so that even the police and the prosecution have greater power to deal with such cases.

Here is what the new law would look like:
The Home Ministry proposes to include a provision in Section 153 of the Indian Penal Code. Further a clause in Section 509 of the IPC will also be included.

Section 153 of the IPC reads- Wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot-if rioting be committed-if not committed.

Section 509 of the IPC reads- Word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman.
Under the Indian Penal Code after the inclusion of the new laws, there would be two new sections- Sections 153 (C) and 509 (A).

The inclusion of provisions into these sections would broaden the scope. It would include the word racist, racism or racist remarks.

Protection against racism is guaranteed in the Indian Constitution. However in the Indian Penal Code there is nothing specific.

Once the sections are included into the IPC, the Code of Criminal Procedure would be amended.

Amending the Cr PC is necessary since there is a need to specify the procedure to try and prosecute racism related incidents in India.

The punishment being specified for a racism related incident would go up to five years and fine or both.

Committee recommendations on racism incidents:
Following a spate of attacks on students especially from the North East the Bezbaruah committee was set up.

While making several recommendations the committee proposed to add specific sections in the law to try such crimes.

The committee had taken into account the deposition by various people especially from the North East. They had told the committee that they are often abused with words such as momos, chinkis and Chinese.

Not specific to North East:
While the most racism related incidents have been reported against those from the North East, the new laws would be applicable for the entire country.

It is not a region specific law and would be applicable to incidents across the country. The law is also not specific to incidents against the people from North East only.

More reforms:
The government of India is also proposing to set up Fast Track Courts for speedy trials in cases relating to racism.

Apart from amending the law there is also a proposal to include the history of North East into the text books so as to make people more aware.

The introduction of a special legal cell to help the people affected by racial attacks and slurs would also be set up.
16 February 2015

Northeast to develop in 10 years if insurgency wanes, says Rajnath

By Syed Sajjad Ali

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh with BSF personnel at Khantlang in North Tripura district on Saturday.- Photo: PTI

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh with BSF personnel at Khantlang in North Tripura district on Saturday.- Photo: PTI

The Union Government would develop the Northeastern region in 10 years if insurgency comes to an end, said Home Minister Rajnath Singh in Agartala on Saturday. He said insurgency remains a hurdle in restoring peace and developing the area, and appealed underground groups to shun violence.
Mr Singh and his deputy Kiren Rijiju were on a brief visit to Tripura primarily to review repatriation of Reang refugees stranded in Kanchanpur of north Tripura for past 18 years, but also flew to visit a border area with Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts at remote Khantlang. The Ministers assessed security and deployment of the BSF in the area where extremists of the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) recently stepped up activities.
Back from Khantlang, Mr. Singh and Mr. Rijiju met leaders of 32,000 Reang or Bru refugees housed in seven camps in Kanchanpur and discussed complete repatriation to Mizoram. The refugee leaders submitted a memorandum in which they complained of threat to security and identity to minority tribe people in Mizoram.
Mr Singh later discussed the issue with Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar and senior Union Home Ministry officials. Mizoram Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla was scheduled to attend the meeting but he skipped.
“Bru (Reang) refugees want to return home and the Mizoram government should help towards a solution of the problem. No discrimination should occur with the Reangs,” Mr Singh said but did not give details of the measures to solve the longstanding crisis.
Rajnath Singh also said that development in the Northeast is not taking speed due to insurgency problem. He appealed to the extremist groups to eschew violence to give the Union government 5 to 10 years’ time to work towards overall development of the region.
He warned that the government will not tolerate violence. Reacting to a query on extremist bases in Bangladesh and Myanmar, he said India has a friendly relation with these neighbouring countries and they are cooperating on security issues.
13 February 2015

RSS Appropriates A Naga Freedom Fighter’s Story And Her Religion

Rani Gaidinliu had struggled against the British rule and for her people's culture. But that history has been stripped of all context by right-wing groups.

By Richard Kamei

For years, freedom fighter Rani Gaidinliu’s role in the resistance against the British rule had become relegated to the periphery. This year, in the centenary anniversary of her birth, her contribution is being marked again. But these celebrations have come with an invidious attempt by right-wing groups to hijack her narrative into the folds of Hinduism.

Gaidinliu was born in 1915 in a small Manipuri village called Luangkao and into one of the three Zeliangrong tribes called the Rongmei Nagas. Aged 16, she took over the unfulfilled cause of her cousin Haipou Jadonang, the Rongmeis’ spiritual leader. Jadonang’s movement had sought the end of the British Raj besides a revival of the Zeliangrong religion and the establishment of the Naga self-rule (or Naga Raj).

Quickly filling Jadonang’s shoes, Gaidinliu led a resistance against the British. The appellation “Rani” was given to her by Jawaharlal Nehru in 1937. Captured and sentenced to life imprisonment, she spent 14 years in prison, the longest incarceration suffered by any Indian freedom fighter. For this untiring fight against the British Raj, the Indian government awarded her the Padma Bhushan.

However, Gaidinliu’s struggle did not end with the Raj’s departure. Soon after, she began protesting against Christian missionaries who she warned were eroding the Zeliangrong culture and tradition. Till her death in February 1993, she kept up the demand for the creation of a Zeliangrong Administrative Unit out of the states of Manipur, Nagaland and Assam.

Indigenous peoples' battles


Today, Gaidinliu’s legacy is viewed primarily through the prism of her role in the freedom struggle. But there are larger parallels between her movement and the everyday battle of indigenous people worldwide against the onslaught on their resources and way of life.

Rani Gaidinliu’s movement against external forces has been appropriated today by right-wing groups like the Vishva Hindu Parishad and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. They have absorbed her life history into their propaganda, where the British and Christian missionaries are the enemies. What’s more, they have arrogated the religion which Gaidinliu followed as similar to Hinduism.

There is a history to this appropriation. The VHP started to interface with Gaidinliu as early as in the 1960s. Even then, they tried to manufacture a relation between Hinduism and Zeliangrong’s religion. At that time Gaidinliu wanted to protect her people’s custom and tradition from the work of Christian missionaries, so she turned to the VHP as a mark of protest against Christianity.

Tensions had been arising periodically between followers of Christianity and Gaidinliu’s movement, which viewed Christianity as an annihilator of their way of life. But the dispute really boiled over in 1958, when the Naga National Council coined the slogan “Nagaland shall be a kingdom for Christ”. The slogan’s obvious exclusion of Zeliangrong people on the basis of religion sparked Gaidinliu’s ire.

Devoid of all context
Hinduism’s influence had, in fact, reached the region earlier. When Jadonang was spearheading the “Naga Raj” campaign along with a religious movement, the Manipur king had proposed to spread Hindu missionaries’ work in the hill districts.

In the reformed religion launched by Jadonang, emphasis was given to Tingkao Ragwang (a supreme creator). From Vaishnavism, Zeliangrong tribes borrowed the significance of temple. The Bisnu worshipped by Zeliangrong is seen as a variation of the Hindu Vishnu but has its distinct identity in the beliefs of Zeliangrong people. It is also crucial to take note of how people adopting Hinduism and Christianity viewed their animistic religion and culture to be inferior.

It is praiseworthy that Gaidinliu’s struggle is being recognised in the 100th year of her birth. But that fight has been stripped of its context by right-wing groups. The freedom struggle of the Zeliangrong people is now portrayed as a religious movement. The RSS, VHP and the Bharatiya Janata Party have appropriated the story of Rani Gaidinliu to suit their propaganda.

This appropriation reflects in their insistence on addressing Gaidinliu as ‘Ma’ (a conflation of Zeliangrong’s religion with Hinduism) and in their effort to extract solidarity out of Christian missionaries' criticism of Gaidinliu. All this does a disservice to Gaidinliu and her people.

The centenary was marked on January 26 by the RSS, National Committee for Birth Centenary Celebration of Rani Ma Gaidinliu, the people of Zeliangrong, as well as the people of Manipur, Nagaland and Assam. But the celebrations will be incomplete unless her unfulfilled goals are realised and Zeliangrong people reconcile with other ethnic communities with shared histories.

Source: scroll.in
11 February 2015

JNU To Soon Get Hostel For Students From Northeast India

New Delhi, Feb 11 :  A 210-room hostel for North East students will be constructed in Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) here, Union Minister Jitendra Singh said on Monday.

Singh, Minister of State for Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), said he had issued instructions to the officials in the Ministry to set up a website where all the grievances of the people from the North East could be received and appropriately responded to. The officers in DoNER Ministry have been directed to hold regular interactions with youth and student representatives living in the national capital.

"A nodal officer in the DoNER Ministry is proposed to be designated for receiving the calls and inputs from the North East origin people living in Delhi," a statement issued by the Minister's office quoted him as saying.
The hostel in JNU is to be built at an estimated cost of Rs 32.44 crore, which will be a four storey structure with total constructed area of about 12,000 sqm.

"The hostel will have an accommodation of 210 living rooms catering to almost double the number of students, in addition to a dining hall for approximately 270 students, four Warden flats and two common rooms," it said. There will also be provision for balcony with living room, pantry, open space between the rooms and a parking lot, the release said.

Singh was also given a brief technical presentation on the plan and outlay by the engineers and architects of RITES, a Railway Ministry PSU. "This will go a long way in enabling the bright youngsters from the region to come closer to the mainstream life of the country. One more site for a similar hostel has also been identified in the premises of Ramanujan College," he said.

Singh visited the JNU campus today to inspect the site proposed for the purpose. He said the number of students from the eight North Eastern states is constantly on the rise and the Ministry of DoNER has taken upon itself the responsibility to encourage and promote their growth in the union capital as well as in other parts of the country. Once this initiative in the capital is successfully accomplished, similar projects will be taken up in other major cities including Bengaluru, Pune and Ahmedabad, the minister said.

India Seeks Singapore Aid To Develop Northeast

By Anirban Bhaumik
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, right, along with Singapore's President Tony Tan Keng Yam before their meeting in New Delhi on Monday. PTI PhotoNew Delhi, Feb 11 :India on Monday sought Singapore’s support to develop and enhance connectivity in the North-East.

A meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Singapore President Tony Tan Keng Yam on Monday identified the city-state’s support to New Delhi’s development and connectivity projects in and around North-East India as a new area of prospective bilateral cooperation.

New Delhi also sought Singapore’s support on urban rejuvenation, particularly on developing smart cities across the country.  Singapore’s president arrived in New Delhi on Sunday for a four-day visit. He had a meeting with Modi at Hyderabad House here on Monday. He also had a separate meeting with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

According to a statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs, Modi and Tony Tan had “wide-ranging discussions on enhancement of bilateral relations and strengthening of cooperation on regional and international issues” to raise India-Singapore partnership “to a higher level”.

Sources told Deccan Herald that New Delhi was actively seeking Singapore’s support to its development and connectivity projects in North-East India. The move came in response to Beijing’s push for Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar Economic Corridor, added sources.

Though India supported a Track-II study group on the BCIM-EC; the security establishments of New Delhi has been cagey about the economic corridor proposed by Beijing.

India’s reservation stems from anticipation that the BCIM-EC project would expose the North-Eastern states – a theatre of many secessionist insurgencies and ethnic conflicts – and its eastern frontier to growing economic influence of China.  During a visit to India last month, Japan’s Foreign Minister, Fumio Kishida, said that Tokyo was ready to support New Delhi’s development initiatives in North-East India, which, according to him, could serve as a connective node between South and South-East Asia.

A Stunning Play With A Simple Message: We Are Indians Too

By Manoj R Nair

Nahaakgee Nunngsirabi - Local Foreigner, a play by Molina (Sushant Singh Production) performs at the HT Kala Ghoda Arts Festival in Mumbai. (Kunal Patil/HT photo)

Mumbai: Sanatombi, a girl from Imphal, Manipur, is in Delhi, having received a scholarship from the culture ministry to learn Kathak. After her first day at the dance school, she is back at the house where she lives as a paying guest. Her mother, a veteran Manipuri dancer, calls from Imphal to ask about the class.

“I don’t know whether it was a good decision to come here,” Sanatombi says.

“The first question everyone asks me is: Kahaan se aayi ho? When I say I am from Imphal in Manipur, they ask ‘Chinese ho? (Are you Chinese?) You do not look Indian.’ They told me that I should not learn Kathak; that there was no future for me in Kathak.”

The next morning, as she prepares to leave for the dance class, she looks in the mirror, at her eyes and nose. She pinches her nose with a clip to make it sharper, till she almost faints from the pain. Her mother calls. Sanatombi tells her that she is in pain.

“So you pulled your nose to look Indian?” the mother asks. “It’s not just the nose,” Sanatombi replies. “The eyes are small too.”

After a particularly traumatic experience in a market, Sanatombi wants to return to Imphal.

When she is asked to perform a Manipuri dance at a function, she uses the opportunity to give her compatriots a little lesson about her home state, including the fact that Chitrangada, the bride of Mahabharata’s Arjun, was from Manipur.

Sanatombi’s experience, lived through by many Indians from the country’s north-east, is shared by Molina Sushant Singh, the Mumbai-based Kathak dancer who played the protagonist in Nahaakgee Nungsirabi (Local Foreigner), a play performed on Tuesday as part of the Zindagi theatre section of the Hindustan Times Kala Ghoda Arts Festival.

“We are Indian but we are still struggling to be accepted. The identity crisis is so much, it hurts you psychologically,” said Singh. “How do you feel if you are not accepted in your home? It is a constant struggle to be Indian.”

The play received a standing ovation from the audience. “I liked the simple way in which the play delivered the message that people from the north-east are Indian and they are badly treated in other parts of the country,” said Rajarshi Banerjee, a theatre director who attended the show.
06 February 2015

Oil India Shale Drill in Northeast India

By Jayanta Roy Chowdhury

New Delhi, Feb 6 :
Oil India has sought permission from the government to hunt for shale oil and gas in several of its blocks in Arunachal and Assam.

At least two of the PSU's blocks in Arunachal Pradesh - Deomali and Jairampur - and three in Assam - Chabua, Dibrugarh and Dumduma - hold potential.

The Union cabinet has already approved the ministry of petroleum and natural gas's proposal to allow state-run oil and gas firms to hunt for shale oil and gas in their existing acreages.

Top officials said Oil India believed Dishang Shales in the 120-sq-km Deomali tract alone could prove to be a major find for the company.

Indian engineers have gathered experience on fracking - the technology to find shale gas - by spending time in the US and are now able to hunt for the scarce resource on their own. Fracking technology sends high pressure streams of water, sand and chemicals into shale formations to bring up the oil and gas.

A former Oil India chairman C. Ratnam has for long advocated that India exploit its shale reserves in Arunachal, which some experts estimate to be up to 14 billion tonnes.

In fact, there has even been speculation that part of China's renewed interest in Arunachal is linked to shale reserves.

The Dishang trap extends northwards from Tirap district of Arunachal towards Kohima and possibly Manipur.

Exploratory drilling had found shale in Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland, but Oil India did not feel they were viable. However, the latest find could be the "big one", say company officials here.

However, most of the exploration area in Arunachal is inside virgin forests and on young hill formations. Environmentalists have objected to fracking because of the damage to forest cover and possible contamination of ground water.

Indian geologists have identified some 28 basins for shale gas exploration. They dispute US Energy Information Administration figures, which place the reserves at 96 trillion cubic feet (tcf).

One estimate by Indian scientists places potential reserves at as high as 527 tcf.

Initial finding shows shale reserves in the east, Northeast and the western states, including Gujarat and Bengal, besides isolated pockets in central India. Last year, ONGC and Oil India had identified 56 shale gas blocks that have the potential to be explored after the Centre cleared a much awaited shale oil and gas policy. ONGC had identified 50 blocks and OIL 6.

"Under the first phase of assessment of shale gas and oil, exploration and exploitation, at present, 56 petroleum exploration lease/petroleum mining lease blocks have been identified by the national oil companies," the oil ministry had said.
04 February 2015

BJP's Vision Documents Northeast Indians Immigrants

http://media2.intoday.in/indiatoday/images/stories//2015February/docs_moss_020315112318.jpg

Union Ministers Ananth Kumar, Harsh Vardhan, Nirmala Sitharaman, Delhi BJP President Satish Upadhyay along with BJP CM candidate Kiran Bedi releasing the partys Vision Document for Delhi Assembly election 2015, in New Delhi on Tuesday. Photo: M Zhazo


New Delhi, Feb 4 : The Vision Document 2015 released by the BJP on Tuesday ahead of the Saturday elections in Delhi has called the people from the Northeast immigrants, raising heckles from the opposition Congress and others.

On page 14 of the document, which replaces a manifesto, it says under the heading 'North Eastern Immigrants to be Protected': "Special cells in all police stations and special 24-hour helpline numbers to be set up for the protection of the NorthEastern migrants. To safeguard the Students of NE origin, special guardianship will be arranged with local families for them."

The Congress was quick to react with its chief ministerial candidate Ajay Maken asking, "Does the BJP consider them to be from some other country?" Maken said the BJP should remove the line from its document.

A grab of BJP's Vision Document 2015.
The national capital has seen a series of racial attacks targeted at the people from the Northeast. Last year, the death of Nido Tania, a student from Arunachal Pradesh, after being beaten by shopkeepers in a South Delhi market, triggered massive protests. Several such incidents are reported every year.

Many took to Twitter to express their outrage over the faux pa. Sanjivee ?@sanjivee said, "First they hide Kiren Rejiju from foreign dignitaries and now in their vision document they term North East Indians as "Immigrants". #fail."

"Shocking that during release of Vision Doc, citizens of NE India are called immigrants. Now you know why they are alienated from you! #Shame," Ramesh Sharma said.

03 February 2015

Govt Nod To Set Up BPOs in The Northeast

Implementing agency looking for private partners for project


The government has given its approval to setting up BPOs in seven Northeast states, taking Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream a step closer to reality.

Now, the Software Technology Park of India (STPI),  which is the implementing authority of the programme, is planning to float a request for proposals to identify private partners for the centres.
As per the plan, the government is planning to set up BPOs, with a total of 5,000 seats, in Assam, Manipur, Tripura, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram.

 
 
The government has set aside a budget of Rs 50 crore for the projects, which would be set up under private-public partnership.

"The government has given its approval three days ago. Now, we are in the process of creating the RFPs. We have to identify the partner agencies which will actually run those call centres and BPO operations, based on a competitive bidding," said Omkar Rai, the director-general of STPI.

"It will be based on the viability gap funding per seat. So the bidder who provides the lowest funding will be the winner," he said.

Prime Minister Modi has been talking about the creation of jobs in the North-East, especially in the BPO sector.

According to Rai, the government estimates show that there is plenty of talent available in the North-East for the BPOs, not just for servicing the domestic clients but also global ones.

"There is no issue with the availability of skill-sets in the Northeast. Only, some leadership positions have to be moved to those places and it can easily be made available," he added.

In the past, the government has been a number of initiatives to enhance IT skills of this region. The Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) has started the initiative to develop IT skills in the region with the help of National Institute of Electronics and Information Technology.

The BPO (also known as the business process management or BPM industry) today employs over million people. In FY14, the industry reported exports of $20 billion, a growth of 11.4 per cent over the previous year. The growth figure is expected to rise going forward with most of the industry players starting to focus on the domestic Indian market.
02 February 2015

India To Complete Myanmar Port Project in May

By Pratim Ranjan Bose

Forex volatility pushes up final cost of Sittwe project 29% at Rs. 450 crore

Kolkata, Feb 2 :  India will complete the reconstruction of Sittwe port and the associated river transport facilities, as part of the Kaladan Multi-modal Transit Transport Project in Myanmar, in May this year.

The project cost, however, is expected to be 29 per cent higher at ₹450 crore, compared with the initial estimate of ₹350 crore, largely due to unexpected volatility in exchange rate, say sources.

The rupee-denominated project was awarded at a time when one dollar was fetching ₹44 and Myanmar Kyat 900. Both the currencies are now ruling at much lower levels.

“The port and the river transport facilities will be ready for operations within the extended timeline of May 2015,” a Government official told BusinessLine.

While the commissioning of the port-cum-waterway will surely boost bilateral relations, India has to wait for years to start transhipment of goods to Mizoram in the North-East, as the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) is yet to kick off the road transport part of the Kaladan project.
Landmark initiative

Having originated at Chin Hills in Myanmar, Kaladan river flows through Mizoram and back into Myanmar’s Sittwe Delta in the gas-rich Arakan peninsula.

Once one of the two most important river ports in Myanmar, Sittwe was used to ferry supplies to the northeast of India during the British Raj. From Sittwe, the cargo was taken by waterway 170 km upstream at Paletwa – where the river encounters rapids – for further travel by head-loads to neighbouring Mizoram. According to a 2008 agreement between the two nations, the MEA proposed to revive this route to establish easy access to North East.

Apart from trade and commerce, the project has immense importance in ensuring India’s political and military interests in the region rivalling China.
Road project hanging fire

Kaladan Multi-modal Transit Transport Project has proposed to revive the river transport route up to Paletwa and build a 129-km-long two-lane highway (NH-502A) through the hilly terrains of Myanmar to connect NH-54 at Lawngtlai in Mizoram.

This would reduce the distance from Kolkata to Aizwal by less than half from the existing 1,550 km. In 2010, Delhi awarded a turnkey contract to improve the navigability of both Sittwe port and river channel, build terminal at Paletwa and handover six self-propelled barges to Naypyidaw. The project is now nearing completion.

But the road project, estimated to cost ₹2,900 crore in 2010, is hanging fire, as contracts are yet to be awarded. Enquiries by Business Line in both Myanmar and India failed to throw any light on the reasons behind the inordinate delay.

“We have no news to share,” said Khin Maung Lynn, Joint Secretary I of Myanmar Institute of Strategic and International Studies, a Yangon-based think tank. Talking on condition of anonymity, an MEA official blamed poor project monitoring and fund crisis as two probable causes. “While the prolonged delay escalates costs, the budgetary constraint of the ministry come in the way of implementing projects,” the official said.
30 January 2015

Northeast Students Asked To Prove They’re Indians

Representational Image. (Photo: PTI/File) Guwahati, Jan 30 : A group of students from prestigious Handique Girls’ College of Assam was prevented from entering the Taj Mahal by authorities because “their faces were looking like foreigners.”
A group of 29 history students from Guwahati-based Handique Girls’ College, were on a college excursion recently to Jaipur, Agra-Mathura, Vrindavan and Delhi to see India’s historical culture. When the group reached Agra to see the Taj Mahal, the students were denied entry and told to buy ticket for foreigners. The obvious reason was that they had Mongoloid features.
When students showed their Permanent Account Number cards, they were told those weren’t enough as a PAN card did not testify whether the person hailed from Assam or not. When the students flanked their college identity cards, the officials said though the college identity cards affirmed that they were from Assam, nowhere on the cards was written that Assam is a part of India.
A student, who was part of the group said that the horrifying incident left them dejected as authorities went on humiliating the teachers accompanying the students. The authorities frisking tickets at the gate even engaged into a verbal brawl with senior professor. 
“They asked us to name the chief minister of Assam and where in India, Assam is located, which subjected us to sheer humiliation,” narrated the students.
This incident came close on the heels of an incident during the Republic Day parade at Rajpath when a girl from Arunachal Pradesh was humiliated and harassed by the crowd by asking her nationality.

The crowd, which branded her as Chinese because of her face went to the extent of lodging complaints with the authorities asking as to how a foreigner was allowed to sit in galley meant for Indians.

Northeast Students Allege Online Racial Abuse

By Raj Shekhar

New Delhi, Jan 30 : In what appears to be a disturbing trend, a number of students from Meghalaya studying in Delhi have approached police alleging that someone has hurled racial abuses at them on a social networking site in the past few months.

According to the complainants, a particular Facebook page titled, "Save the Hindus of Himalaya", has carried objectionable messages targeting Khasi students. The Economic Offences Wing has lodged an FIR under Section 66 (A) of the IT Act and IPC 153(A) (spreading hatred between two groups).

While Facebook has blocked the page, police are yet to receive the IP address of the user. They said the accused will be arrested once they receive his coordinates. Data released by the northeast cell of Delhi Police reveal that it has registered 28 cases of cyber crime in the past eight months.

In the complaint submitted to the joint commissioner, Satish Golcha, the Meghalaya students' union has said the Facebook page has been active for more than a year, but in the past few weeks, its administrator has shown more aggression in "his" tone. "There have also been incidents of him instigating people to physically harm those from Meghalaya, especially the Khasis. As students from the state of Meghalaya, we feel that our people, especially the students are disturbed and scared with this kind of language being used in social media," said the complainant, Simon Duncan Kharsohtun. A senior police officer said a complaint from Simon and other students from Meghalaya was received. "During inquiry, a notice was sent to Facebook (USA) to provide the details of the page.

Facebook has intimated that the page has been blocked but we have asked for further information," the officer said. Between May 9 and January 29, police received 1,010 distress calls, of these 780 were crime-related. A total of 290 FIRs were registered on these calls in the past eight months.

South district, which has the maximum number of people from the northeast, has recorded 320 complaints while the southeast Delhi stands second with 66 complaints. Northwest district has received 52 complaints, southwest 51, north 48, west 41, east 22, central 18, New Delhi 16, outer 13 and northeast district, which has the least population, has received merely 7 complaints.

Among the police stations in south Delhi, Vasant Vihar received 71 complaints, Safdarjung Enclave 59, Malviya Nagar 29, Kotla 28, Mukherjee Nagar 28, Vasant Kunj 47, Timarpur 17, Mehrauli 19, and South Campus and RK Puram 17 each.
29 January 2015

Delhi To Have Special Hostels For Northeast Students

New Delhi, Jan 29 : The central government Wednesday proposed to set up special hostels for students from the northeast region studying in Delhi.

Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) Minister Jitendra Singh ordered a sub-committee be set up consisting of representatives from offices of resident commissioners of various states as well as representatives of the DoNER ministry to identify suitable location and land for construction of such hostels.

The minister was addressing a meeting here of resident commissioners of the northeastern states.

The accessibility, security and availability of basic amenities should be important consideration while planning such hostels, an official release said.

Singh also issued instructions for carrying forward negotiations about the venues which were shortlisted as possible locations for these hostels.

The minister called upon the resident commissioners to maintain a regular and closer interaction with his ministry in a more institutionalised manner.

Singh suggested each resident commissioner could collect general information about the profile and composition of the people from his state living in Delhi. This would enable the DoNER ministry to focus its plans on specific needs of students, youth, elderly citizens, women and other sections of society from each state residing in Delhi.

27 January 2015

Northeast Woman Treated Like Alien At Parade

By Vishnu Sukumaran

New Delhi, Jan 27 : Couple reports her to police, frisked again

“Do I look like a terrorist or a Chinese?” said a 32-year-old lawyer from Arunachal Pradesh who claimed to have faced racial discrimination when she went to watch the Republic Day parade at Rajpath on Monday.

Liyi Noshi said a couple sitting next to her in an enclosure thought that she was not Indian, and they went to security personnel to find out how she entered the area.

Security personnel then questioned her and she had to undergo frisking in the enclosure despite being frisked three times before reaching there.

Liyi, who hails from East Siang district in Arunachal Pradesh, lives in a rented house at Pushp Vihar in Saket, and practices at Saket court.

She had reached enclosure number 23 in Rajpath at 7.30 am after standing in long queues for 90 minutes.

As it was raining, she was wearing a raincoat and was carrying nothing other than an ID card, a spectacle case, some keys and a couple of hundred rupees in cash.

She said that a couple and two men were sitting next to her.

 “I was reading a booklet distributed in the enclosure about the two-hour-long procession when the man sitting next to me came there with a security personnel. The cop told me that the couple had complained about me being a security threat,” Liyi says.

Liyi was shocked to hear the allegations, and said no women security personnel were even called to attend to the complaint.

“The policeman asked for my ID card to prove my nationality and then told me to empty my jacket’s pockets. I told the policeman that I had crossed several layers of security to reach there, but he refused to listen. I was treated as if I was a terrorist or some Chinese spy,” she added.

Pockets emptied

On being left with no other option, Liyi emptied her pockets to prove her innocence.

As no incriminating material was found with her, the policeman apologised to Liyi, but did not take any action against the couple.

“I was racially discriminated and humiliated in front of a packed enclosure. I felt so disrespected as an Indian that I tore the invite and left the enclosure,” Noshi said.

“I cried on the way back, but was not able to seek help from people known to me as I was not carrying my mobile phone,” she added.

The matter was reported to Robin Hibu, Joint Commissioner of Delhi Police (Training), who is in charge of north-east affairs.

Liyi has decided against taking legal action.

“This is not the first time that I faced racial discrimination in this city. Being a woman from the north-east community, we are routinely treated like outsiders who can be mistreated and humiliated,” she added.