Shillong: The North East Students Organisation (NESO) Friday demanded capital punishment for those involved in racial attacks against people from northeast in other parts of India.
NESO chairman Samuel Jyrwa said: “We have submitted a letter to Home Minister Rajnath Singh and his deputy Kiren Rijiju demanding that capital punishment should be awarded to those involved in racial attacks and murder of a woman from Mizoram.”
“Besides awarding capital punishment to those perpetrators, NESO has asked the home minister to enact a stringent law to deal with such crimes against the people from the northeast,” Jyrwa said.
The demand of the apex student’s body from the northeastern states came after a woman from Mizoram Juliet Zonunmawi was murdered in her house in South Delhi’s Munirka area, two youths from Nagaland were assaulted in Gurgaon Wednesday night and a Manipuri student was beaten up by a group of people in Bangalore for not speaking in Kannada.
“Although such incidents have been vehemently denounced by the government at different levels, northeast communities continue to suffer shock and panic as unabated attack and assault continues against them,” Jyrwa said.
Saying that incidents of assaults and molestations are happening on a frequent basis resulting in a feeling of insecurity, especially among the women folk, NESO appeals to all state governments to take immediate and effective measures for “mental, physical and social security” of the people from the region.
“We have asked central government to set up a special police cell in all the metropolitan cities which will cater specifically to cases related to racial discrimination and atrocities on the students and people from the northeast in line with the Delhi model, with a provision that it is manned by police officers from the northeastern states.”
The NESO supremo also demanded that the central government make one-time deployment of at least 5,000 Delhi Police personnel in the capitals of the eight northeastern states.
Earlier, this year, the then central government had constituted a committee headed by Madan Prasad Bezbaruah to look into the issues pertaining to people of northeastern states living in different parts of the country after an uproar following the barbaric murder of an Arunachali Nido Tania.