In Bangalore, three drunken men attacked a young Manipuri man, leaving him hospitalised. In Delhi, a Manipuri student, Zingran Kengoo, was found dead in his apartment with his throat slip open. Both crimes were reported on Wednesday, typifying the violence faced by North Easterners across the country.
Racially motivated attacks against North Easterners came into sharp focus in January with the murder of Nido Tania, an Arunachali student living in Delhi.
As outrage swept the nation, the government appointed the Bezbaruah Committee to examine the concerns of people from the region living in other parts of India. Though the committee submitted its report in July, recommending strong legal measures to protect North Easterners, Parliament has not discussed its findings.
“I met Kiren Rijiju [the Union minister of state for home affairs] several times after submitting the report, but unfortunately received only tokenistic gestures,” said David Boyes, a member of the Bezbaruah Committee and convenor of the North East India Forum Against Racism. “I am upset with the state. MPs from the North East show their faces occasionally and then slumber.”
Little has changed since Nido’s murder. The Delhi police has become far more willing to register cases relating to people from the North East, Boyes acknowledged, and even has a special cell and a hotline for people from the region. But other parts of the country are yet to follow.
Laws and society
Though India became a signatory of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1967, it has no anti-racial discrimination laws. But curbing racism cannot be about law alone. Some countries with anti-discrimination laws have rarely implemented them.
For instance, Bolivia passed a strong anti-racism law a little more than three years ago, but nobody had been convicted under it until February. Media outlets there complain now that the law is being misused to curb freedom of expression.
The more effective solutions, however, could be those that take the message to ordinary people.
“The Nirbhaya case was taken up by everyone, which is why today we have a strong law protecting women,” Boyes said. “The anti-ragging law also acts as a strong deterrent. A legislation may not be the ultimate solution, but the fact is that the government is denying racism. Even with the vast majority of Indians, we get little support when we talk about racism. Ultimately, this is not good for the nation.”
No country has been entirely successful in stamping out racism. But here is how some have attempted to tackle discrimination over the last few decades.
1. Acknowledge it exists (Australia)
Before India can begin to tackle racism, it needs a law to show that the state acknowledges it exists.
Australia, which has a particularly violent history of racism, passed its anti-racism law in 1975. Until 1969, the Australian government, as official policy, forcibly removed aboriginal children from their families to “integrate” them into white society. The government did not apologise for this until 2008.
In 2012, the Australian Human Rights Commission launched its National Anti-Racism Strategy that seeks to move the country beyond its history of violent discrimination. The programme, to run until 2015, will raise public awareness and talk about housing, police, sport, the internet, health and other sites of potential racial discrimination.
2. Start with schools (Poland)
If racism is to decline, India needs to work to ensure that all its citizens are on board the effort. Indian education, with its ample dousing in the policies of the ruling party of the day, is a perfect place to begin this project.
Poland is among the countries now experimenting with this. During World War II, three million out of the country’s 3.5 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust. In recent years, Poland has also seen a sharp rise in racism in sports, particularly in football.
The Never Again Foundation, an independent NGO founded in 1996, is among several working against racism in Poland. In 2012, it decided to address rising racism with a pilot education programme aimed at teachers and students. The pilot was successful and the organisation now plans to take this forward.
3. Run mass media campaigns (United Kingdom)
Talking to young people is not enough. Governments can also harness the power of mass media campaigns to promote multiculturalism. The United Kingdom might be on the wrong side of the debate now with its education minister Michael Gove pitching for scaling back on talking about culture that is not “British”.
The Commission for Racial Equality, a public body now merged into the Equality and Human Rights Commission, has a series of posters about racism. The effect of these posters is debatable, given the state of the United Kingdom today, but India has to start somewhere and since we already have mastered part of the art of public propaganda, we will not have too far to go.
4. Don't stop support for anti-hate groups (Canada)
If it is difficult enough to begin acknowledging hate crimes, it is even tougher to sustain that effort.
Canada has a Ministry of Multiculturalism and Immigration to monitor hate crimes, but since the late 1990s it has been systematically cutting funding to human rights groups. According to the Canadian Anti-racism Education and Research Society, “There is now absolutely no national monitoring or tracking of hate groups in the country.”
In 2012, around half of all hate crimes reported to the police were racially linked.
This is a precedent for India to avoid.
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Racially motivated attacks against North Easterners came into sharp focus in January with the murder of Nido Tania, an Arunachali student living in Delhi.
As outrage swept the nation, the government appointed the Bezbaruah Committee to examine the concerns of people from the region living in other parts of India. Though the committee submitted its report in July, recommending strong legal measures to protect North Easterners, Parliament has not discussed its findings.
“I met Kiren Rijiju [the Union minister of state for home affairs] several times after submitting the report, but unfortunately received only tokenistic gestures,” said David Boyes, a member of the Bezbaruah Committee and convenor of the North East India Forum Against Racism. “I am upset with the state. MPs from the North East show their faces occasionally and then slumber.”
Little has changed since Nido’s murder. The Delhi police has become far more willing to register cases relating to people from the North East, Boyes acknowledged, and even has a special cell and a hotline for people from the region. But other parts of the country are yet to follow.
Laws and society
Though India became a signatory of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1967, it has no anti-racial discrimination laws. But curbing racism cannot be about law alone. Some countries with anti-discrimination laws have rarely implemented them.
For instance, Bolivia passed a strong anti-racism law a little more than three years ago, but nobody had been convicted under it until February. Media outlets there complain now that the law is being misused to curb freedom of expression.
The more effective solutions, however, could be those that take the message to ordinary people.
“The Nirbhaya case was taken up by everyone, which is why today we have a strong law protecting women,” Boyes said. “The anti-ragging law also acts as a strong deterrent. A legislation may not be the ultimate solution, but the fact is that the government is denying racism. Even with the vast majority of Indians, we get little support when we talk about racism. Ultimately, this is not good for the nation.”
No country has been entirely successful in stamping out racism. But here is how some have attempted to tackle discrimination over the last few decades.
1. Acknowledge it exists (Australia)
Before India can begin to tackle racism, it needs a law to show that the state acknowledges it exists.
Australia, which has a particularly violent history of racism, passed its anti-racism law in 1975. Until 1969, the Australian government, as official policy, forcibly removed aboriginal children from their families to “integrate” them into white society. The government did not apologise for this until 2008.
In 2012, the Australian Human Rights Commission launched its National Anti-Racism Strategy that seeks to move the country beyond its history of violent discrimination. The programme, to run until 2015, will raise public awareness and talk about housing, police, sport, the internet, health and other sites of potential racial discrimination.
2. Start with schools (Poland)
If racism is to decline, India needs to work to ensure that all its citizens are on board the effort. Indian education, with its ample dousing in the policies of the ruling party of the day, is a perfect place to begin this project.
Poland is among the countries now experimenting with this. During World War II, three million out of the country’s 3.5 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust. In recent years, Poland has also seen a sharp rise in racism in sports, particularly in football.
The Never Again Foundation, an independent NGO founded in 1996, is among several working against racism in Poland. In 2012, it decided to address rising racism with a pilot education programme aimed at teachers and students. The pilot was successful and the organisation now plans to take this forward.
3. Run mass media campaigns (United Kingdom)
Talking to young people is not enough. Governments can also harness the power of mass media campaigns to promote multiculturalism. The United Kingdom might be on the wrong side of the debate now with its education minister Michael Gove pitching for scaling back on talking about culture that is not “British”.
The Commission for Racial Equality, a public body now merged into the Equality and Human Rights Commission, has a series of posters about racism. The effect of these posters is debatable, given the state of the United Kingdom today, but India has to start somewhere and since we already have mastered part of the art of public propaganda, we will not have too far to go.
4. Don't stop support for anti-hate groups (Canada)
If it is difficult enough to begin acknowledging hate crimes, it is even tougher to sustain that effort.
Canada has a Ministry of Multiculturalism and Immigration to monitor hate crimes, but since the late 1990s it has been systematically cutting funding to human rights groups. According to the Canadian Anti-racism Education and Research Society, “There is now absolutely no national monitoring or tracking of hate groups in the country.”
In 2012, around half of all hate crimes reported to the police were racially linked.
This is a precedent for India to avoid.