The exodus of Northeast people from Bengaluru to their native place is unprecedented. India had never witnessed this kind of panic migration in its past. Despite the government’s efforts to pacify the situation that has put the people of Northeast in a tizzy, nothing seems to make them believe that they are safe outside home.
“I am from the Jalukbari area in Assam. I am staying here in Bengaluru for the last four years. This is the first time that people here have started looking at me twice and then asking, ‘Hey you are from Northeast na. How is the situation there?’ What to say? I am feeling that I come from such a place in India which no one knows,” says Junuma Kachari, a homeopathy doctor. Fear is spreading across India like fever, from cities like Bengaluru to smaller places like Pune. And thousands of migrants from the country’s north-eastern states are jamming into train stations in an exodus challenging the country’s ideals of tolerance and diversity.
The situation is grim in Bengaluru where, according to reports, 30,000 Northeast people have left the state in just three days. Although the government has started enforcing confidence-building measures and has deployed six companies of Rapid Action Force, besides increased police patrolling in areas mainly inhabited by Northeast people, the people there are in no mood to take any chances.
“I have been staying in Bengaluru for the last six years, but I have never experienced such a situation before. People are running and leaving the state just out of fear. No communal riots have happened here and neither I am being discriminated,” says Prasenjit Saha, who is from Assam and works with HDFC Bank in Bengaluru. “I would ask people not to take fast decision. We are from this country and we have the right to live anywhere in India,” Mr Saha added.
To many north-eastern migrants in Delhi, the impulse to rush home is a reminder of how alienated they have started to feel from the mainstream India.
“The ongoing violence in Assam is the result of continuous neglect of the region, failure of the state and Central governments to check illegal migration from Bangladesh, giving free hand to local groups to fight for political power and, most importantly, underlying fractions over the land. It is depressing that now the violence is taking a communal flavour and attacks have started on Assamese people and others from the Northeast region,” says Kaustav Padmapati, senior research associate in NCERT.
He says that a better understanding of the demographic and geographical background of the Bodoland area can end this communal tension.
Although there is no violence reported from Delhi-NCR region, there is panic in the minds of people from Notheast in Delhi, with their families staying in the Northeast asking them to return as soon as possible. According to the parents, life is what it counts.
“It’s good that no violent incident has yet been reported in Delhi region, but there is fear in the minds of Northeast people. My friends in Bengaluru said that certain shopkeepers were asking them where are they from and why are they here, says Nungshi Thoibi Singha, a corporate from Delhi.