The unanimous decision taken by the legislative assembly Speakers of all Northeast states on Friday’s virtual meeting chaired by State LA Speaker Pasang D Sona to press the Central leaders for initiating   comprehensive measures to put an end to the practice of racial discrimination against the Northeast people in the mainland is a much-needed initiative. People of the Northeast, due to physiognomic similarities with the Chinese are at the receiving end in various parts of the country and there are a particular section of people who never waste the slightest of opportunities to launch trolls against them, either in public places or the now-preferred route of social media platforms. This has almost become a habit among many such people and sheer ignorance about the Northeast and its people is the main reason. However, since  there has been an increase in such incidents of harassment and discrimination in recent years which certainly reached its peak during the first wave of the pandemic last year, it’s high time to commence a national dialogue and leaders, irrespective of political parties must come forward. The habit must end at once and if appeals don’t work, relevant laws must be applied. It’s a stark violation of multiple Articles of the Constitution and the laws to safeguard them must be invoked appropriately, just as it has been in the recent case of YouTuber  Paras Singh.

There are a variety of reasons why such a hostile mentality against the NE people is observed among a good number of citizens in the mainland states. For decades, due to limited connectivity opportunities with the region, people-to-people interactions never really blossomed to the level that would have truly captured the ‘One Nation’ concept. It has remained only on a theoretical plane and with no opportunities for learning about the region and its people right at the school level, the detachment has only sustained in an amplified mode. There are strong reasons why the NCERT syllabus must immediately include detailed chapter(s) on NE’s history, geography, indigeneity, food habits and people and the recent Twitter storm that saw nearly 147 lakh #NortheastMatters tweets and 141 lakh #AChapterForNE within a span of two hours with wide support from every section of society like film artists, politicians, journalists, social media influencers, celebrities etc. mirrors it all. Without nurturing any doubt that in general the NE people face harassment in the mainland, it still needs mentioning that it would be wrong to go for a generalization. A successful footballer from the NE in Kolkata gets hero worship and will always receive so. It’s a question of attitude of inclusiveness which varies from state to state.

A great detachment is there and whatever needs to be done, building a national consensus or the syllabus route should be started immediately.