The muted silence
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: July 23, 2014 -
When the incident of fatal racial attack on Akha Salouni, a 29-year old young man from Manipur’s Tungjoy village in Senapati district, by five people in the wee hours of July 21 at Kotla Mubarakpur area of South Delhi reverberated in Parliament on Tuesday and Chief Minister of Nagaland TR Zeliang has come out strongly against the killing and urged the personal intervention of Home Minister Rajnath Singh to ensure that the guilty do not go unpunished, it is really disheartening to know that no politicians from Manipur have thought it even proper to call up the bereaved family members to convey their condolences or the student leaders who are running around for ensuring justice to the latest victim of a continuing hate crime against people of Northeast origin.
When many of the members in both Houses of the Parliament including Deputy Chairman in Rajya Sabha P.J. Kurien expressed their concern over violence against people from the North-eastern part of the country, none of the three MPs from Manipur (two in Lok Sabha and one in Rajya Sabha), were seen taking part or heard to say anything during discussion on the incident that has taken away the life of young and promising Manipuri youth.
This muted silence on the part of our elected MPs says a lot on the recurring incidents of hate crimes against their own people in other parts of the country.
Back home, the incident did come up for discussion in the State Assembly, which is currently in session.
But, here too, the reaction and response of the Honourable members has only left a bitter taste in the mouth of the people.
Everyone knows that Delhi or any other parts of the country are not safe for the people of Northeast origin, who are always at the receiving end of hate crimes and violence.
So, to harp on this well-known fact or to say the obvious in the State Assembly is not going to help in anyway in the effort towards curbing the menace of hate crime against people of Northeast origin in Delhi and other metropolitan cities of the country.
But this was exactly what the honourable members and the Minister concerned had done in their effort to show themselves as really concern about the issue.
Had the State Government been following the case closely and establishing communication with the Delhi Police as claimed, then why is that the Home Minister quoted some stale report on the number of the arrest made and the rest of the honourable members in the House satisfied with the response?
Well, as M.P. Bezbaruah, chairperson of the Committee formed by the Union Home Ministry after Nido Tania’s death in January last to suggest remedial measures for curbing hate crimes against Northeast people, has observed, “only police action and reforms cannot lower crime against the people from the northeast.
It is the mindsets of the people and the ideology they adopt against a certain community that need to be changed,” perhaps this change of mindset needs to start from our own elected representatives.
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