No city for northeasterners?

Women from the region increasingly face sexual harassment, with two cases reported last week alone

"Chinki" and "Chilli chicken": These are two offensive, derogatory terms that people from the northeastern community claim to hear regularly even in a cosmopolitan city like namma Bengaluru.

To top the racial discrimination, women of the community are being increasingly subjected to assault and sexual harassment, with two separate incidents having been reported in the last week alone.

Last Wednesday, 25-year-old Jen Hmar from Assam was allegedly racially abused by an auto rickshaw driver during an argument over fare, and on Monday, chilling CCTV footage emerged of a 22-year-old Manipuri woman who was brazenly abducted by a stranger on the road on April 23. The city police have made an arrest in one case, and lodged FIR in the other. Probes are underway.

In Karnataka, the North East community consists of over 3 lakh men and women from Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Assam, Sikkim, Tripura, and Arunachal Pradesh, with a majority of them working at private firms and the rest studying at various institutions.

A large number of women work in salon services and similar jobs at malls and shopping complexes and live in rented rooms or paying guest accommodations, making them especially vulnerable to exploitation.

So how safe do they really feel in the city? What do they think can be done to turn things around?

For the last few days, North East Welfare Association general secretary Len Singson's phone has been ringing off the hook, and his Facebook inbox has been flooded with messages from concerned community members.

"Masses of women have been calling to ask what we are doing to ensure safety for women after the recent kidnap and molestation bid on a Manipuri girl. I have been reassuring them that we should rely on the police to conduct an impartial investigation and not jump to conclusions, but I must say they were not appeased," Len tells Mirror.

"We will decide on whether to approach the Home Minister or not based on the outcome of the police enquiry. While no one is talking of leaving the city, everyone is determined that we stand together and do something."

Having been in the city for just over a decade, Len opines that the population of North East Indians in the city has increased manifold, as have the attacks against them. While there is no specific hotline for those in distress, Len and other office bearers of the association are on standby 24x7 in case of emergencies.

Meanwhile, former city police commissioner HT Sangliana's daughter, Rachel, who was racially abused and assaulted by two women in a supermarket in December 2014, feels it is not just the lower-middle class, but educated people who are equally to blame.

"My eldest daughter is eight years old, and for a long time now, she has been coming home from school saying her classmates ask if she is from China. No matter how many times she says no, they apparently persist and insist she looks different. Even my nanny, who is from Mizoram, has been sexually harassed many times by random but well-dressed, seemingly educated men on the street who have followed and tried to befriend her. She is now scared to stay outside for long," says Rachel.

Knowing the local language does not help much since the discrimination is primarily based on looks, she claims. Given that a lot of North Eastern women, especially the younger ones, dress in trendy clothing like short skirts or dresses, the men presume it is okay to badger them.

"Nowadays, most girls and women have begun dressing the way they want, but that doesn't seem to deter men from specifically approaching North Eastern women. I believe education and awareness must begin at home, and issues of race and harassment must be tackled head on. People need to stop alienating us based on where we come from. We are, after all, Indians too," she adds.

Final-year degree student at a prestigious women's college in Vasanthnagar, Lina Thapa, alleges the police are not very friendly with them either. She recalls an instance where she and a few friends were walking near Museum Road and were reportedly eve-teased and followed for a distance by some boys, and when they tried to tell two policemen they saw nearby, the cops laughed it off.

"We just want to be taken seriously and treated like everyone else. We are not aggressive and do not deserve to be treated like outcasts; but it is up to people to understand this and get rid of preconceived notions," she says.

PAST INCIDENTS OF ATTACKS

August 2012: Nearly 8,000 fear-struck people from North East flee city following rumours of impending violence against the community circulated through SMSes, e-mails, and videos on WhatsApp October 2012: A 21-year-old student of NLSIU was gang-raped by 8 drunken men on the Bangalore University campus October 2014: Manipuri student leader and engineering graduate Michael Haokip was bashed up by three men for allegedly not knowing the local language

December 2014: HT Sangliana's daughter Rachel was allegedly punched and racially abused by two women over a trivial issue at supermarket