Do people from the northeast feel welcome and safe in Bengaluru? I set out to find out just that. (Unsplash/TiAchen Aier)
A few days ago, I came across a reel on Instagram of a woman from Assam, which highlighted a crucial problem — racism towards people from the Northeastern states of India.
While the reel was done comically with the woman trying to be casual about it, the undertone of it was anything but funny.
“Do plate momo lagao.” “Nepali ho?” “You must give good massages.” “You eat dogs and snakes, right?”
Such were some of the awful slurs that the woman revealed she had faced.
This led me to think of all the untoward and tasteless instances of racism towards people from the Northeast that I have witnessed in the many major cities where I have lived.
Bengaluru is a melting pot of different cultures & ethnicities. (Unsplash/Saransh Sinha)
Having newly arrived in Bengaluru, I wondered if the situation was similar here in the city as well.
Do the people from the Northeast feel safe here? Do they encounter instances of racism?
In my quest to find the answers, I came across something wonderful that reaffirmed my faith in this city, which of late has been facing a barrage of hate on the internet over an assortment of issues.
“Racism? In Bengaluru? I have never faced a single instance of that in the seven years that I have lived here,” says 28-year-old Meenu Basumatary, right off the bat.
Basumatary, who works as a beauty therapist, was skeptical when she moved to Bengaluru from her village in Assam, however, in just a week, she realised she had nothing to worry about.
“No one was staring at me, giving me weird looks or taunting me with racist insults. Life was normal and that normalcy was exactly what I had hoped for when I moved here,” she shares.
Siema Hmar from Haflong, Assam, who has been living in Bengaluru for 14 years, echoes a similar sentiment.
“I have lived in so many places in India and I have to say, nothing beats Bengaluru. The people here are very respectful and they do not discriminate,” says the 39-year-old, adding that Bengaluru is a city where he can seek greener pastures.
The IT professional couldn’t stress enough how much he wanted everyone to visit Bengaluru at least once, just to soak in the city’s diversity.
Lila Imchen, a 22-year-old fashion design student hailing from Dimapur, Nagaland, says that even though it took her a while to get accustomed to Bengaluru, she now feels at home.
It may take a while, but Bengaluru’s old-age charm can make anyone feel at home. (Unsplash/Raghavendra Prasad)
“For the first three months, I was homesick. Despite having lots of friends here and being active in my church, I was not able to adapt to the city. I was facing slight issues with the local language and the people seemed indifferent,” Imchen notes.
However, soon, Imchen realised that she could survive in Bengaluru without being fluent in Kannada. After managing to track down a few Naga stores and restaurants, her outlook towards the city began to change.
“The indifference I thought I was experiencing was simple respect for my privacy. It was also my fault for expecting to be stared at, as I had experienced that in the previous city I was living,” she says.
Imchen also loves how Bengaluru locals just let you be, which is a very freeing feeling.
Speaking in a similar vein is 28-year-old David J Haokip, from Lamka Town, Churachandpur district of Manipur, who has been in Bengaluru for two years now and can’t stop gushing about the city.
“I have never felt a sense of alienation in any way,” he says, adding that he enjoys the friendly banter he has with street vendors, auto drivers, and bike riders.
Haokip also appreciates how the locals are accepting of diverse cultures, something he could not find much of during his time in North India.
‘I mistook respect for my privacy by locals as indifference,” Lila Imchen. (Unsplash/Ranjith Alingal)
Being apologetic about the fact that he can’t speak Kannada, Haokip asserts that he is planning to learn the language for the sake of basic communication in the city.
That said, he faces no difficulty manoeuvring across the city without knowing the language.
Haokip also feels it would not be fair to say Bengaluru is 100 percent free of racism, as he has heard of instances of conflict between people from the Northeast and locals.
“However, such issues are normal as we are all human and are not perfect. Even within families, there are fights and disagreements,” he shares.
In a city where the migrant population is burgeoning by the day, there is bound to be a section of disgruntled locals unhappy watching the influx.
While being in a new city comes with its host of challenges, the biggest has always been the obstacle of learning the language.
While one can manoeuvre in Bengaluru without knowing Kannada, it is encouraged to learn the basics. (Unsplash/Partha Pratim Duwarah)
Prashant Longjam (name changed) from Manipur, who has been in the city for over six years now, can still remember almost coming to blows in the busy streets of Majestic two years ago.
“I remember boarding a bus in Majestic to visit my friend in Hebbal. As I rushed to grab an empty seat I had spotted amid the crowd, I was knocked askew and fell face-first into the floor of the bus,” recalls Longjam.
Looking up to see who pushed him, Longjam saw a man in his 50s plonking down on the seat he had spotted, cursing him out thoroughly in Kannada.
“You don’t need to know a language to know when someone is spewing unpleasant words,” he recalls, when I asked him how he knew he was being cussed out.
“I immediately told him in Hindi how that was my seat and that he should get up. Again, a stream of angry Kannada was directed towards me and he sat in the seat and refused to budge,” he recalls.
“He got off after three stops and I took the seat. I noticed the young man next to me looking at me and I felt this wave of irritation surging in me. Turning to give him an earful in my language, I was surprised with what he did next.”
With awe in his voice, Longjam recalls how the college student apologised to him in English for the older man’s behaviour. “When I asked him to translate what the old man said, he told me ‘he said you should go back to where you came from and stop crowding the city’.”
However, the student also told Longjam that he should not take the man’s words to heart as that is not how a true Bengalurean is and that he should not see this incident as a judgment for all locals.
“That has been the only racist incident I have faced in my seven years here. Two things happened that day. I was attacked and apologised to as well by the locals. For me, that is what helped me heal fast,” Longjam says.
However, Longjam hopes that the attitude of locals and the certain stereotypes they hold towards people from the Northeast in the service industry will change over time.
“It’s great if we have a job in a well-known company or are a student. But I have noticed that people in the service industry, especially in salons and hotels, have a tougher time. People see them as lesser and I know of cases where a few locals have misbehaved with them solely because of where they came from. I hope that changes,” he says.
As Haokip pointed out, Bengaluru has its share of evils but for an “outsider” arriving in the city and making it their home, that’s not a pipe dream here.
Especially for people from the Northeast, who leave their homes with dreams of living in metropolitan cities and being accepted by the locals, Bengaluru is on the path to becoming a haven.
And that speaks volumes of how Bengaluru is becoming a melting pot of various cultures and ethnicities, while maintaining the city’s values and culture.
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