No less deadly than Coronavirus

India, with a population of 1,210,193,422 as accounted bythe 1st March 2011 population census, is a colourful canvas portraying a uniqueassimilation of ethnic groups displaying varied cultures and religions. In factthis uniqueness in ethnicity of the country is a factor that makes it differentfrom other nations. However the vastness of India’s nationalism, accounting toa plethora of cultural extravaganza, religions etc.,  is the reason that thecountry is seen more as a seat for a major world civilization than a merenation state.

It’s a fact that cultural diversification from state tostate is immense. We know that every year thousand of young people from NorthEast migrate to New Delhi and other cities for higher education and jobs. Theseven states  known as “seven sisters” areconnected to India with a sliver of land that spans over the northern top ofBangladesh and are plagued with chronic underdevelopment and separatist conflicts.

   

It’s common for the people from northeast to be called’chinkies’, a word so common that may have become immune to it, but derogatoryenough for the government to punish its use with five year jail term.Harassment from landlords, employers, and assaults on the streets arecommonplace. All of this leads to those people feeling alienated and left out.Indians have deep rooted racism against them and after the outbreak of thecorona virus the racist comments have just worsened.

Recently Alana Golme, a member of monitoring committee wrotea letter to the ministry of Home Affairs (NE division). In her letter, shewrote how the north eastern people are now being called “corona virus” andfacing blatant racism in the wake of new pandemic rocking the world. To callpeople who are already being attacked by the name is cruel. It was in 2014 whenthe cases of racism were much worse, people were mugged, harassed and evenkilled due to their ethnic identity around the country.

Alana pointed out how long they have been at the receivingend of all kinds of racism by all sorts of people. However most of the cases ofracism reported are from Delhi. The national capital, a major metro city, andhome to a number of well-known educational institution is the place that treatspeople in such a cruel manner. India basically has a racism problem that goes unnoticed owing to casteisim,and it is this inherent racism that is building a wall and creating barriersbetween our own people.

A student of Delhi University Noihrit Gogoi has encounteredvarious types of name calling everyday for looking a certain way, hailing fromthe northeast and for speaking Hindi with a different accent. Coronavirus waslargely seen as a Chinese disease that started in China and pretty much did theround among Chinese people before making to every other country. Since most ofthe students from the northeast have Mongoloid features, resembling the averageChinese national, they have to bear the brunt of now being called coronavirus.

A lot of other students from the colleges of DelhiUniversity echo similar problems. Neha, another student from Assam said she isbeing called coronavirus and people told her that the virus spread to Indiafrom China via northeast. She says, “this is quite sad and ridiculous at thesame time, but sadly there is nothing we can do.

Reema, another student recalls how she and her friends werecalled “bearers of coronavirus”. She said this was probably one of the worstdays of my life. “My friends and I were walking to a metro station, when threemen threw a giant water balloon at my friend’s bosom”. She says she was completelydrenched. “The minute we got inside the metro someone frowned upon us and saidthese Chinese people are so shameless that they walk around spreadingcoronavirus everywhere”.

Young techie Hmingtei chhangta, who originates from Manipurnarrated that it was just a week back when she visited a grocery store that afew men teared her saying “coronavirus aa gaya” ( coronavirus has come).

Namguiling Panmel hails from the same state Manipur saidwhile returning from a friend’s place “I took off my helmet and hung it on thetwo wheeler I was riding. A traffic cop stopped me and asked for my documentsand licence, all of which I provided. I paid the fine for not wearing thehelmet, but commented that he had let all other helmetless riders off exceptme. His response left me shocked; “woh log tou local log admi hai, tum tohchina sai hona, kisko pata tere pass coronavirus hai ki nahi” (They are locals.You are from China. Who knows if you are infected or not.)

It is indeed disheartening to hear such stories knowing thatthere are still people roaming around who think of this as funny. North Easthas always been isolated and the people, termed aliens. It’s time to changethat attitude.

In the midst of an epidemic as this, it is important for allof us to come together and help each other out instead of targetingpeople. There have been many cases of racism that came to fore after the casesof corona virus. In such a tragedy, a lot of the countries have had a rise inanti-Chinese racism attacks.

The world is grappling with a terrible health emergency andit is natural to feel the fear. But that doesn’t give us the leeway to attackother people because of their ethnicity. For people from the northeast, it hasbeen a repeated attack on their existence and frankly, it is too much at thispoint.

Maybe stories like these will lead people to think beforethey speak or act. Here’s hoping we get a solution for corona as well as theracism.

The writer is a student of political science at AligarhMuslim University

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