'Most People Haven't Studied Geography'

By Nina C George

The death of Nido Tania, a young boy from Arunachal Pradesh, has triggered a sense of fear among the North-East community living in the City which is riled by being constantly mocked at, harassed and even ridiculed.

They often are pejoratively referred to as Chinese, Japanese and ‘foreigners’ in their own country. They get asked as to which ‘country’ they are from. And this appals the two-and-a-half lakh odd North-East people in the City to no end.

The community as a whole, especially the women, confesses that it doesn’t feel safe in the City. The general notion that the north of the country was notorious for incidents of harassment and violence and south was a safer place is fast disappearing.

Sharing her experience, Elvina Haokip, a student confesses that she had some terrible moments dealing with autorickshaw drivers. “It was a little after dusk and I was returning from college. I boarded an auto and agreed to pay a little extra to get home quickly. After a little distance, the auto driver began staring at me with an irritating smile. He kept mumbling something to himself. I was terrified but sat still,” she recollects. Haopu Mate, another student, says that he often gets referred to as a ‘foreigner’.

“I boarded a bus last week. I didn’t have change and gave the conductor Rs 100. He had the change but he refused to part with it and began abusing me in the local language. He asked me to get off the bus. I refused and questioned him why should I do so, since I was not travelling free. He didn’t say anything, instead he pushed me out,” says Haopu Mate.

James, a banker, always gets asked where he is from and when he says Manipur, people immediately ask him ‘which country is that?’ “Looks like most people haven’t studied geography in school. How can they miss the North-Eastern part of India? Worse still, they don’t know the difference between Chinese, Japanese and people from the North East.

Don’t we have the right to live, walk free and pursue any profession and education of our choice in our own country?” James wonders. He further states that he has been stopped and shouted at by a few strangers at night while returning from work. “There is rowdyism back in our hometown but not to this extent,” he adds.    

Goulen has completed his education and is preparing for competitive exams. Goulen says, “We are educated and come from good families. Why should we be stopped in the middle of the road, mocked at and abused for no fault of ours? I don’t speak the local language. Hence, I stay away from getting into an argument.”

Hencha Kipgen is a hotelier, who lives in Ulsoor. He confesses that he was stopped on his way home recently and asked where he’s from by a gang of men on two bikes. “I told them that I am an Indian but they kept asking me which country I am from. I am helpless because I can’t speak the local language.

They hurled a couple of abuses at me and left. I returned the abuse in my local tongue. Why shouldn’t I react?”he asks. 

Rocky Kipgen, who works in a salon, concludes, “We are harmless and we shouldn’t be judged based on our features or where we are from. I think people should live and let live.”

Government to set up committee on north-eastern youth

NEW DELHI: Condemning death of Arunachal Pradesh student Nido Taniam, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday said violence preceding his death was "tragic and shameful"

The Union Home Ministry, meanwhile, was ready to set up a committee of retired bureaucrats to address the larger issue of isolation and discrimination of youth from the North-East.

"While the actual cause of Nido Taniam's death will be known only after the autopsy report is received, the violence which preceded his demise is tragic and shameful. Our government will make every possible effort to punish the guilty and to provide effective protection to students and citizens from different parts of the country, especially the northeast, who visit or reside in Delhi," the PM said in a statement.

A home ministry official said a committee of four-five retired bureaucrats, including one from Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland and others with a "strong connection" with northeast, would be set up soon and given two-three months to come up with a comprehensive report on how to integrate north-east youth and steps required to stop racial abuse against them.

"A magisterial inquiry, which is being conducted by a District Magistrate, will meanwhile concentrate on Tania's death, the circumstances surrounding it and specifically the grave lapses of the Delhi police. The police had no business trying to strike a compromise between Tania and the accused shopkeepers who assaulted him. They should have immediately lodged an FIR on charges of assault and also promptly booked the shopkeepers for violating section 3 of the SC/ST Act as they had racially abuse/teased Tania. But an FIR was lodged only after Tania's death," the ministry official said.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal who visited Jantar Mantar on Tuesday where north-east youth are sitting on a candle-light protest, said the magisterial probe will be over in 3-4 weeks and action will follow.

The twin down South

By Ashwini Gangal

Vim recently released a campaign featuring a Mizoram-based family with 160 members. The campaign comprises two identical films featuring different brand ambassadors - one famous in the North and the other in the South. A look at the geography-sensitive, dual-celeb route, something other brands have also taken of late.

Vim, dishwashing brand from HUL, recently launched two 30 seconders. The Hindi ad features Sakshi Tanwar, TV actress of Hindi GEC fame and the Tamil ad features Devayani, film actress down South. What caught our attention is that both ads are identical, except for the celebrity and of course, the language.
Few weeks back, Santoor, soap brand from Wipro, did the same with Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan and Telugu actor Mahesh Babu. Not long before that Mondelēz International's Cadbury India, launched a couple of ad films for its cookie brand Oreo; Ranbir Kapoor featured in the national campaign and Tamil actor Karthik Sivakumar (aka Karthi) featured in the TVC that was aired across Tamil Nadu and Kerala-specific media. Just like in the case of Vim, in these cases too, both ads were identical on all fronts - script, overall treatment, creative execution, costumes and actors' expressions.

Pan-India Ideas?

R Sridhar, founder, brand-comm, a brand consultancy, says that while brands have historically been launching separate campaigns for the South market, the point to be noted here is that today, the national and South campaigns are identical. This, he notes, is possible only if the core theme is very broad. "While Coca-Cola has been endorsed by Aamir Khan nationally and by superstar Vijay in the South, the scripts of the ads featuring each were completely different. The trend we see today is that the themes brands are selecting for their campaigns are very generic and inherently pan-India." Oreo's brother-sister play or Vim's utensil cleaning challenge are not ideas that are intrinsically rooted in a particular geography. "Brands seem to be coming up with 'general' ideas such as these," Sridhar says.
This also solves the problem of translating the script at a later date. Often in translation, the essence of the original script gets lost. But as is seen in this trend, the two scripts are thought of right at the inception stage itself and are then executed simultaneously; not as an after-thought that goes, 'Now let's translate and dub this Hindi ad into Tamil.' "In the future, I do see more ads with such general themes, that is, themes good enough to hold nationally," predicts Sridhar.

The "cultural contexts" in the North and South, as Mahuya Chaturvedi, managing partner, Cogito Consulting (independent consulting division of the Draftfcb Ulka Group) points out, are believed to be opposite. The flamboyance and high decibel entertainment of the North is in direct contrast to the disciplinarian and information-hungry stance of the South. "Likewise, in advertising," she says, "while the South would like to know 'what benefit?', 'why?', and details about ingredients, the North enjoys the narrative, the humour and the music."

"Which is why, when marketers hit upon an emotional hotspot, like women's quest for eternal youth (read: Santoor), the transferability across borders is more effortless," she says, about the trend.
Chaturvedi shares an example of a brand that, in the past, has created entirely different campaigns for the North and South markets: Tetra Pak conveyed its 'protection proposition' to its Northern audience by using the black tika (dot) on a new born baby, while in the South the same end was achieved by demonstrating the actual stamina and energy of a kid. While the current trend of creating identical ads with different celebrities is a sustained admission that the two markets are indeed different, it is also a time-effective way out, from an effort-and-execution perspective.

She points out yet another trend: The use of 'South characters' and 'South lingo' in pan-India campaigns. For instance, Idea Cellular showed a South Indian dad playing Holi with kids in an ad film not too long back and Mahindra's ad for the Duro featured Kareena Kapoor - a star with far less appeal in the South than the North - liberally using 'Romba Nalla' as the catch phrase all through the Tamil commercial. "These ads caught a chuckle because of the surprise value," Chaturvedi says. Some experts attribute this ancillary trend to "media overlap" between the South and other markets.
According to experts, the 'dual-celeb, identical ad' trend is here to stay. Chaturvedi alerts us to a study by Millward Brown, a research agency, which suggests that only one in seven ads travels well across the country and has similar likeability/enjoyment scores; in all, 1,000 ads were studied. Maybe the dual-celeb route was born out of such findings. Come to think of it, the only endorsers left with national appeal are perhaps cricketers. So would a Dhoni have appeal in Chennai? Yes. But whether it is because cricket surpasses state boundaries or because he is captain of Chennai Super Kings is anyone's guess.

Vim Story
The Vim commercials feature the world's largest family (160 members) that resides in Mizoram. The ads are shot in and around their home.

Joshua Thomas, creative director at Lowe Lintas & Partners India, stumbled upon information about this family, while working on a Vim brief. The agency then went ahead and presented a campaign idea, centered on this family, to the brand team. "Vim communication is always set in a 'challenge' context. This family seemed like a perfect fit for a 'torture test' brief. The brief came first and the idea of using the family came later," informs the HUL company spokesperson.

In a sense, the campaign takes the brand out of the kitchen and onto a larger canvas. Will going back to the previous 'kitchen imagery' be a challenge for the brand in the days ahead? "When you view the advertisements, you will notice that the brand is still shown in and around the kitchen. It is just the context and story that take place in a larger setting. Dirty utensils exist everywhere and this was just one way of conveying the brand's message. So in that sense, we don't really see any problem for subsequent campaigns," says the spokesperson.

The shoot took around four days to complete, although a dialogue with the family was initiated a few months back. A lot of the shots in the films are candid shots of the family members going about their daily routine. Understandably, both logistics and language were challenges the agency was faced with. The family speaks Mizo and the services of an interpreter were availed for this campaign.

Interestingly, the extreme North and North Eastern parts of India don't get featured much mainstream ad campaigns, unless of course, the effort is to show that the product/service is available in every nook and corner of India - like in the case of the recent Tata Sky commercial, shot in Leh Ladakh, in the Northern most state of J&K; "India ke kisi bhi koney se..." went the voice-over artist.

While integration was not an agenda - ("This advertisement was made with the sole aim of communicating the brand's message and hence should be viewed through that lens only," goes the HUL spokesperson) - it may well be a welcome byproduct of the Vim campaign.

The media agency is Mindshare and the production house is All in the Family. The ads have been directed by Vishal Gehani.

source: afaqs.com

"You bloody chinky" - We Hear This Everyday

By Binalakshmi Nepram

Binalakshmi Nepram is a writer and activist.

Binalakshmi Nepram is a writer and activist. She is the founder of Manipur Women Gun Survivors Network (MWGSN). 

She met with Rahul Gandhi yesterday and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal today to demand justice for Nido Taniam, the 20-year-old who died after he was beaten up by a group of men at a South Delhi market. 

This is Binalakshmi's blog (as told to ndtv.com).

Nido was a victim of racial profiling. A lot of young boys and girls are victims - everyday. I'm a victim myself. Just now, I was waiting for an auto-rickshaw and 6-7 empty autos went by without stopping for me. There are many, many cases but they are not reported. We are called 'Nepali dhanda karne wale, you bloody chinki'. Has a person from Kashmir or Chennai ever been beaten to death in Delhi? Delhi, unfortunately is the worst. So many kids come here from the North East for higher education and this is the kind of discrimination they have to face every day.

We met yesterday (Monday) with Mr Rahul Gandhi.  He was very upset and assured us that there would be a committee like the Justice Verma Committee that was constituted after the Delhi gang-rape to look into Nido's case. He also admitted that this was a case of racial discrimination. Mr Kejriwal joined us in our protests at Jantar Mantar today.

When we met Mr Kejriwal yesterday, we advised him to form a special committee - on the lines of the Justice Mehra committee - only for Delhi and the National Capital Region. He liked the idea.  The Delhi government has to ensure this happens and look at different cases of racial discrimination.

60% of the North Eastern kids who leave their hometowns are in Delhi. The Delhi Education Minister should ensure that the culture, tradition of the North East is a part of the curriculum of Delhi schools so that there is no prejudice...so we are not looked at as aliens.

A helpline which was launched some years ago to receive calls for help from North Eastern students doesn't work at all. It is manned by the Delhi Police and the Delhi police itself is biased. Most of the policemen are from Haryana - they are extremely racist. It would help if the Delhi Police recruited some people from the North East.

The government must focus on the formation of an anti-racial, anti-discrimination law. We don't have anything of the sort at the moment.  And we need a special fast-track court to try these hate crimes.

In Delhi, we face violence, sexual assault.  There is verbal abuse and taunting.  It is rampant, it happens at every moment.

There is a fear psychosis in the minds of many young people who study or work in Delhi. We tell them only cowards indulge in this kind of racial discrimination. Delhi doesn't belong to a single community. We have requested the Ministry of Home Affairs to tighten security.

This is my message to youngsters from North Eastern states living in Delhi. This city is as much as yours as it is of other citizens. Only cowards do these kind of racial attacks. Please do not be scared or intimidated. Cases are being solved. Delhi belongs to everyone.

'My spirit and heart is with you': Rahul visits anti-racism protestors and brands Nido's death 'totally unacceptable'

Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Monday called the alleged racist murder in New Delhi of 19-year-old Nido Taniam as "totally unacceptable" as he met students from the North East, who were holding a candlelight vigil at Jantar Mantar for the deceased student from Arunachal Pradesh.

The Gandhi scion's support of the protest is in stark contrast to the silence he maintained over the December 16 gang-rape in the Capital in 2012.

Vigil: Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi pays homage to Nido Taniam at Jantar Mantar

Demands: Protesters at Jantar Mantar are demanding speedy justice for Nido Taniam

Talking to the students, Rahul said: "Which India matters to you? Only one India matters to me where there is justice. My spirit and heart is with you. I am 100 per cent with you."

He left the crowd assured that strict action would be taken in the case and said work has begun on setting up a committee to study cases of violence against people from the North East in the metros.
Rahul's assurances showed quick results, with the Delhi Police arresting three people in connection with the case.

POLICE ARREST THREE FOR DEATH OF NIDO

Six persons, including two juveniles, were involved in the assault that allegedly led to the death of Nido Taniam, the police said on Monday.

Three persons have been arrested for assaulting the Arunachali teenager, the police said.
Among the arrested persons are Farman and Akram.

AN SIT has been formed under the supervision of DCP (South- East) P. Karunakaran to investigate the case.

During investigation, it has emerged that Taniam was brought to the police station by a PCR van.

"From the police station, Taniam was taken for inquiry to the spot by two police officers, but he was not assaulted again there," Delhi Police spokesperson Rajan Bhagat said.

Taniam was then brought back to the police station by both the officers.

He was later handed over to a family friend Vinod R. Bansal and his friend Varun with whom he left the police station.

The police have also constituted a special investigation team (SIT) to investigate Taniam's death. The protesters read out 16 demands to Rahul and a memorandum was submitted to him.

Runu Boham, a family friend of the Taniam's, presented a letter from the family to Rahul, which was read out.

"The assurance from Rahul Gandhi and his presence here has given us the assurance that justice will be done," she said.

Scores of students joined the sit-in, which was organised by the Arunachal Students' Union Delhi (ASUD), Naga Students' Union Delhi (NSUD) and other student associations from Nagaland, Tripura, Sikkim, Manipur and Assam.

However, the protesters are in no mood to budge and have vowed to continue the candlelight vigil till their demands are met.

"We cannot rely on politicians. We need to see results," said one of the protestors.

"We want the SHO and constable to be suspended and the culprits to be brought to book. We demand a strong anti-racial law, which should be debated in the upcoming session of Parliament.

"Until we see results, the protest will continue everyday from 3pm to 7pm at Jantar Mantar. We will start an indefinite hunger strike from Thursday if our demands are not met," said Arunachal Student Union vice-president Yeshi Wangchu.

Geethartha Barua, additional private secretary to the Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh, alleged that lower-rung police officials at the Lajpat Nagar police station were trying to "manipulate" the findings of the autopsy report as it would suit the police to simply say that Taniam's death was not related to the thrashing he received from the shopkeepers in the area on January 29.

"There is a possibility that he (Tania) was coerced to sign the documents stating that he does not require a medical examination," said Barua.

Kon Jirjo a family friend of the deceased said: "People are trying to portray that Nido was fit when he left the police station, which is not true.

"Some people are spreading rumours that he had taken excessive pain killers which might have led to his death. This is not true."

Slogans such as 'Long live Nido' and 'down with racism' resonated at the protest site.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said he has lost faith in the state police

Kejriwal cornered over Nido's death

The Arvind Kejriwal government found itself cornered on two fronts by the Delhi HC and the LG's office over the death of Nido Taniam, on Monday.
Taking suo moto cognisance of media reports about the attack on the North-East student, the Delhi HC issued notices to the Centre, the Delhi government and the police, seeking a report on the steps taken to ensure the safety of the N-E students after the incident by February 5.
"The incident has raised concerns over the security of students from the North-East in the Capital.
"Even girls from the region are harassed here. If one remains unsafe in the Capital, what will the condition be in the rest of the country?," a division bench asked.
Meanwhile, Delhi Lt. Governor Najeeb Jung questioned Kejriwal's decision to order a magisterial probe. Kejriwal, however, said that the state has lost confidence in the abilities of the Delhi Police.

Four more people were arrested on Monday for alleged involvement in the molestation and assault of two Manipuri women in south Delhi's Kotla Mubarakpur area, police said.
The police has not revealed the identity of the four saying that a test identification parade will be conducted first.
Meanwhile, the main accused Prem Chand, was sent to a day's remand after investigators said they needed him for further interrogation to trace the other accused.

Northeast Tops Cancer List

Aizawl, the capital of Mizoram, has the highest incidence of cancer in India. This is true for both men and women. The Northeast as a whole is most susceptible to the disease, according to data from the national cancer registry’s consolidated report for 2009-11.

According to the report, which is likely to be released by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in the next few months, the Northeast takes the top three slots for the incidence of cancer among both men and women.

The age adjusted rate — a statistical tool to compare incidence among different communities at particular ages — for all cancers among men is 273.4 per 100,000 population in Aizawl, followed by Meghalaya’s East Khasi Hills district (216), the rest of Mizoram state (189.5), and Kamrup Urban in Assam (185.7).

For women, Aizawl reported the highest incidence at 227.8 cases per 100,000 population, followed by Kamrup Urban (156.3), Mizoram state (153.7), and Bangalore (137.2).

Data from state population-based registries show that cancers of the lung, mouth, oesophagus, stomach and nasopharynx are the most common among men. Among women, cancers of the breast, cervix, uterus, oesophagus and lung are the most common.

Sources said the data shows that the Northeast has the highest incidence of stomach cancer in both men and women, besides a very high rate of oral cancer.

“High incidence of smoking, which has been found to be higher than the national average among both men and women, and habits like using angeethis that produce a lot of smoke in closed spaces are possible contributing factors,” Dr P K Jhulka, radiation oncologist and dean at AIIMS, who is also in charge of the Delhi cancer registry, said.

“Consumption of other tobacco products is also very high. Eating habits like consumption of smoked and fermented meats could also have a role to play,” Dr Jhulka added.

Among the metros, Delhi is on top of the list for men with 125.2 cases per 100,000 population; Bangalore tops for women (137.2). Delhi is tenth on the all-India men’s list; Bangalore fourth on the all-India women’s.

Lung cancer is the most common cancer among men in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Chennai. Delhi, with 13.9 cases per 100,000 population, has reported the highest incidence of lung cancer in the country.

In Bhopal and Ahmedabad Urban, mouth cancer is the most common. Prostrate, tongue and mouth cancers are the most common after lung cancer in Delhi and Mumbai; stomach cancer is the second most common among men in Bangalore. In Ahmedabad, tongue and lung cancer are the second and third most common respectively.

Among women, breast cancer remains the most common everywhere except in Barshi, Maharashtra, where cancer of the cervix is most common, followed by cancers of the breast and oesophagus.

In keeping with data from previous reports, for women, cancers of the cervix and ovary are the second and third most common. Delhi has, however, seen a recent spurt in gall bladder cancer, which has jumped to third place at 9.2 cases per 100,000 population, pushing ovarian cancers to fourth (8.2).

According to Dr Jhulka, “Delhi and other areas in the Indo-Gangetic plain have thrown up a high incidence of gall bladder cases among women. We suspect chemicals in the soil may have a role to play.”

Dr Jhulka added that AIIMS is currently in the process of obtaining clearances from its ethics body to start a molecular study in “representative” areas of the region to understand the reasons more fully.

“The molecular study will help us understand the genetic mutations in patients diagnosed with gall bladder cancers. Certain genes are known to be associated with causes like smoking, and certain known chemicals. This will help us understand the cause,” Dr Jhulka said.

Mizoram Govt trying to set up Lokayukta by February end

Aizawl, Feb 4 : Mizoram Law Minister Lalsawta on Sunday said that the state government was making efforts to meet the deadline of establishing Lokayukta before February 28.

The recent AICC meeting had decided that all the Congress-ruled states should have Lokayukta before February end. Lalsawta told PTI that the Lokayukta drafting committee, headed by state Law Secretary P Singthanga, had completed its task on January 30 and detailed scrutiny was being conducted under his supervision.

"We would re-examine the draft bill on Wednesday," he said, adding it would be placed before the state Cabinet soon.

He said the main hurdle in setting up of the ombudsman would be acute financial problems being faced by the state.

"We wanted the Lokayukta to be totally independent, which included the investigating wing and the prosecution," the law minister said.

According to the draft bill, the Lokayukta would be headed by a person placed at the rank of the Chief Justice of a high court and members at the rank of a high court judge.

There would be no one on deputation among the officials of the Lokayukta and the state Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB), being under the state government would not be used as its investigating agency, Lalsawta said.

"This would require a huge amount of money and we would be approaching the visiting Finance Commission to allocate fund for establishment of the Lokayukta," he said.

The draft bill said the Chief Minister and his cabinet colleagues would be within the ambit of the ombudsman.

The state government would constitute a search committee for appointment of Lokayukta and other members while the Selection Committee would comprise the Chief Minister, Speaker of the state legislature, leader of the opposition and the chief justice of the Gauhati High Court.

The term of the Lokayukta and the members would be five years after which they would be prohibited to hold any official position under the government.

Cultural ignorance and prejudice

By Lawrence Liang & Golan Naulak

The Hindu DISHARMONY: The ‘racism’ word understandably provokes a fair amount of discomfort since it presents an unattractive picture which stands in sharp contrast to the official ‘unity in diversity’ rhetoric. Picture shows a protest in Bangalore following the Nido Tania incident. Photo: G.P. Sampath Kumar

Racism in India has so far been debated in relation to the caste question but the northeast question is an opportunity to imagine modes of collective living which go beyond lip service multiculturalism

While the Supreme Court may have relegated LGBT people back to the closet (at least legally) the issue of racism in India on the other hand — with the vigilante raid against African women and now Nido Tania’s death — has been outed and we can either choose to confront it or continue to live under the delusion that all is well in our multicultural wonderland. And if the issue is out, it is perhaps time to differentiate between racism with a capital R and racism with a small r, or, in the world of the media blitzkrieg that we inhabit we could distinguish it as front page racism and footnote racism. Nido’s death — shocking as it is — is merely symptomatic of a much larger systemic malaise of how we deal with cultural difference in this country. While racism occasionally manifests itself in the form of hate crime it is felt most acutely as an everyday phenomenon in the form of snideness, smirks, casual references to someone being “chinki” and morally upright judgments about clothing and sexuality. On that count, it would be difficult to find a single northeastern Indian who has not at some point faced the brunt either of unwelcome banter or culturally curious questions (“Is it true you eat snakes?”) whose naïveté would be touching were it not so offensive.

Ignorance and prejudices

The ‘racism’ word understandably provokes a fair amount of discomfort since it presents an unattractive picture which stands in sharp contrast to the official “unity in diversity” rhetoric. And yet it is a little ironic that even as we fume with righteous indignation at the treatment of Indians in the United States or Europe, we are shocked when we are accused of racism ourselves. Even if we were to agree with detractors who argue that it may be rash to characterise Nido’s killing as an instance of a hate crime or a racist attack and that it was just an instance of hooliganism that could have happened to anyone, it is a little difficult to forget that the comments about his looks and hairstyle which prompted Nido’s angry response smacked of racism. Nido’s death is a sad testimony to the fact that we are able to speak about systemic everyday racism only when confronted with the capital R variety.

Commentators have observed that the cultural ignorance and prejudices have always existed in India citing the familiar example of how all South Indians are “Madrasis” and those living north of the Vindhyas are clubbed “Punjabis.” But it is important to recognise one crucial difference in the way that people from the northeast are treated. While a north Indian may be called a Punjabi or a South Indian a Madrasi, the markers are still within the rubric of Indian nationhood whereas it is not uncommon for northeastern Indians to be hailed as Chinese, Japanese, Nepali or Korean. One of the placards in the protest against racism in Delhi on Saturday read: “We are confused and scared in our own country. What shall we call ourselves? Indians? Nepalis? Chinese?” When was the last time someone from Delhi was called an Afghan because of the similarity of his or her facial features? Kashmiris on the other hand can equally testify to the generous bestowing of indiscriminate citizenship having been accustomed to being called Pakistanis.

In the protests and the debates on media that have ensued, one of the recurring themes and slogans has been “We are Indians too.” While this is understandable as a claim of equal citizenship it is also a little disturbing since it casts a burden on people from the northeast having to prove their sameness rather than assert the right to be different. What then of the expatriate Japanese or Chinese community? Do they abrogate their right against non discrimination because they are not Indians? By framing the experience of racism within a limited rubric of citizenship alone we run the risk of obfuscating questions of national identity with questions of belonging. It is in fact ironic that groups who have proudly claimed their self-determination on the basis of their unique identity have to respond to the experience of racism through a sentimental language of citizenship.

A truly cosmopolitan ideal is one in which a city or a country can belong to you even if you do not belong to it and while it is tempting to resort to a liberal plea for promoting cultural awareness and the importance of “mainstreaming the northeast” — the complicated history of the northeast with its various self-determination movements and armed struggles requires a slightly different imagination of multicultural citizenship — one in which we move not from cultural difference into sameness but from cultural difference to cultural difference.

Opportunity to imagine

Racism in India has so far been debated in relation to the caste question but the northeast question is one that allows us an opportunity to imagine modes of collective living which go beyond the lip service multiculturalism of exotic floats accompanied by tribal dances in Republic Day parades. The presence of northeastern Indians in “mainstream” India extends the very concept of India and demands a political and ethical imagination beyond inclusion into history textbooks and speedy trials of hate crime cases alone; it asks instead what it may mean for the mainstream to be open to be northeasternised, for Maharashtrians to be a little more Bihari’d and to acknowledge that a plurality of hairstyles and food cultures only enriches our collective selves. The French philosopher, Gilles Deleuze once remarked that it is better to be a schizophrenic out for a walk than a neurotic on a couch — perhaps a bold imagination of our diversity demands that we be comfortable with our multiple identities if we are not to collapse into the neurosis of the singular.

Incidents like the Richard Loitam, Dana Sangma and now Nido Tania cases have the possibility of opening many old wounds which have only been tenuously resolved in recent times. It is not surprising that in the midst of the protest against racism, one protester chanted “Hame kya chhahiye? Azadi chhahiye.” This was echoed by many others who were there. It was a spontaneous act but one that stands witness to the fact that even if the Azadi is not about self-determination any longer, it echoes an underlying sense that they have never belonged. If we fail to understand that the call for freedom first and foremost emanates from the struggle against racism and discrimination, we run the risk of collapsing into what Tagore once described as a world broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls.

(Lawrence Liang is a lawyer and researcher with the Alternative Law Forum. Golan Naulak is with Our Little Stories, currently based in New Delhi.)