By IANS,
New Delhi : Holding banners and raising slogans, over 300 students of northeastern states held a demonstration here Friday protesting the rising crime against their community in the capital even as Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit promised immediate action to ensure their safety.
‘Northeasterns are soft targets because the state neglects them’, read one of the banners that protesting students held at Jantar Mantar.
Diskhit, who met the students, listened to their grievances and assured them that the government will “do its best” to check crime against the community.
“Delhi is as much yours as it is of anyone else. Please take this out of your mind that you are being neglected or racially discriminated. The government will do all it can to ensure your safety,” Dikshit said.
“I will have a meeting with a delegation of northeast MPs on Monday or Tuesday and we will decide on a concrete plan of action to check these crimes. We will hopefully launch a 24/7 toll free helpline number for the northeast students and women soon,” she added.
Happy that their voices had finally attracted attention, the students said they hoped the officials will keep their word and come up with a concrete plan of action for their safety.
Alo Bashu, a member of the Naga students union in the capital, said: “Frankly I’m sceptical of what the political leaders say but this time I’m hoping that things will materialise. We will not give up until they do.”.
“Northeast is as much a part of India as any other part of the country. Then why are northeastern people discriminated and constantly targeted? And why does the state government not do anything about it? Our demand is very simple – stop the discrimination and give us justice,” Bashu told IANS.
Akhum-la, another protestor, holding a banner that read ‘Don’t kill the modesty, dignity of women’, said: “Every time Delhi Police says they will cooperate with us and take stringent action against those who target the northeast community for absolutely no fault of ours. We are tired of such empty words.”
Joining hands with the aggrieved students, Takam Sanjay, an MP from Arunachal Pradesh said: “The northeast MPs forum, which is a delegation of over 30 MPs from the region, will meet the home minister next week and will bring to his notice the rising law and order problem and targeting of the northeastern youngsters in Delhi.”
The agitating students also demanded that all the old, pending cases of crime against northeastern people in Delhi be taken into account immediately.
“We want all culprits who target us and think they can get away with it, be punished stringently,” said Luikang, president of the Naga Students’ Union.
While there have been an several cases of molestation and crime against the community,what triggered the protests was the brutal murder of a Naga girl last week. Nineteen-year-old Ramchanphy Hongray was strangulated by her neighbour Pushpum Sinha, a PhD scholar of IIT, in her Munirka home in south Delhi.
Sinha, who is said to be suffering from obsessive compulsive disorder, then burnt the girl’s face to mislead the police. Sinha killed the girl as she had spurned his advances and he thought she would spill the beans, the police had said.