Nido's Death is a collateral damage. I feel sad.

We tend to respond emotionally to emotions. I know that death does not become easy even if we lose so many young lives accidentally, or suddenly, everyday. I too feel saddened. However, I want to go beyond feeling sad in this case, and try to understand the real cause of such an outburst.

Nido's death is beyond racial discrimination. It is about a social, economic and a political problem.

Human beings like any other animal are territorial by nature. A sense of ownership of a territory happens by virtue of ethnicity, language, place of birth, religion and other such parameters of belongingness. Civilization, education, laws and policing have made us better than animals, and human beings are therefore have become far more tolerant and understanding of territorial concerns.

We have to now understand if there are triggers that can make human beings less tolerant and angry about their perceived territorial rights. In 1998, when I was in Satya Niketan (New Delhi), NE students like me were in almost every 10th house. Today, I am told, we are in every 5th house. Isn't that a little bit of an imbalance?

If you see the number of lonely old parents in the different cities and towns of Assam and the other Northeastern states, you will understand the problem definition that I am expounding here. In my hometown of Duliajan, there are hardly any students studying in local colleges. A rough estimate would be that over 50% students after their 12th standard goes out to Delhi, Bangalore or Pune. Duliajan, being a richer town has these phenomenal proportions, and the proportions are not so high in other towns. But it is quite sizeable and significant.

If this is the level of exodus to supposedly better places outside northeast, and Delhi being the preferred destination for most Northeast students and parents, we may find some triggers that may create instances like Nido, and other similar attacks.

Migration is natural but this level of crazy migration is un-natural and is bound to have collateral damages. The tolerance of the local citizens will be severely tested with such high levels of migration. If the same level of migration had happened towards Assam (or Arunachal Pradesh), armed revolt would have happened killing hundreds. It is common knowledge how Assam had revolutions against outsiders. Even today the climate is tense in Assam, Meghalaya, Manipur etc. Manipur does not allow Hindi cinema exhibition for instance. So I may tend to think that Delhi and Mumbai are far more tolerant places as compared to so many other places of India.

We have to understand why are we sending our youths outside the state in such large proportions. There are social reasons and there are political reasons.

The Government has failed to create the confidence in the available local infrastructure. Although Northeast has education infrastructure which can support a lot more students, the Government has failed to maintain the available infrastructure in the highest standards. Primary education has mushroomed all over the region, but secondary education is where the Government had to put a lot more focus.

Secondly, the Government has not encouraged or facilitated the growth of private sector in terms of small scale, medium scale and large scale industries. This has led to the lack of jobs in the region. Government is the only job-giver in the region. Students therefore flock to Delhi and other places to study with the hope that they will get a job as well after their studies.

There is a social pressure as well to send kids outside the region. It is the talk of pride for parents to tell the neighbors about where their kids are studying, or staying. I had migrated to Delhi after graduation, studied post graduation in Ahmedabad and then worked in Mumbai for 16 years. Today I am back to my hometown where I should have been there in the first place. I don't see a reason why we should encourage kids to go outside, live in a new culture and become something that they are not. There are enough and more ways to create value in our hometowns. The problem here is the negative perception about business and entrepreneurship. It is the salary that we seek, and not the uncertainty of business.

We have to understand however that it is entrepreneurship spirt that builds a nation, a state. Gujarat is developed not because of Modi, but because of the relentless entrepreneurship spirit of the Gujaratis. All the communities in India who have a developed entrepreneurship spirit are the communities that are known across the world and are richer than other communities.

Lot many Nidos will happen if we don't reverse the migration trend, which I also call Brain Drain. The government and the people of the region have to get conscious of this problem of brain drain and try to reduce the same. Nido's death in the capital city of India is a collateral damage, like the death of many 'outsiders' in the Northeast. The reason lies elsewhere, and not on racial discrimination like the media has put forth.

Delhi Rape Incident - Danger Sign of a Dual Society

My time with Twitter severely increased, for the hashtag #delhirape kept me angry, frustrated, curious and sarcastic; all at the same time.

Most of the tweets said what Napoleon Bonaparte had said over 200 years ago, "The act of policing is, in order to punish less often, to punish more severely."

Indeed the rapist should be publicly punished severely.

The other majority of tweets were a bit of a concern. They were of women shouting their words of anger and wisdom about how females are being taken for granted, coerced and exploited. Any tweet condescending to femininity were thrashed and castrated. 

There were tweets by a few men of reckoning, expressing that girls should be accompanied by elders at night for safety. They didn't know what hit them before they could even read their own tweet.

Although, it is sad that it took a heinous crime like rape for the citizens to come out in protest, yet it is a delight because Democracy works best when people claim it as their own, and participate. We should hope that this protest ultimately concludes into the reasons behind such a heinous social phenomenon of raping a women.

This is not the first rape and we have seen that rapes were rampant even during the protests across the country. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, the incidents of rape went up by 873 percent between 1953 and 2011. This is three times faster than all cognizable crimes put together and three-and-a-half times faster than murder. Between 2007 and 2011 alone, rape incidents have increased by 9.7 percent. This is reported figure and we can fairly add a multiplier to these statistics.

I am not a social scientist, but I am a keen observer who have spent 37 years in this country. I have experienced this country before social media, before economic liberalization, and during Doordarshan. I have seen the times when two flowers connoted kissing in movies. I have been in the cusp of time when joint families were dis-integrating into nuclear families.  I have seen tennis transform from knee length skirts to bum-length skirts, while the shorts of the men tennis players perhaps increased in length.

The most critical change that I have seen is what media, satellite television and Internet  have brought in. The information about the glamour and lifestyles of people living in Mumbai (or any metro) became known to people living in villages. Sadly, it was the content that got broadcasted across the country without the accompanying context. 

India was always disparate in terms of income, culture and lifestyle, but it was not known and seen. Now, with technology, the perceived disparity is much more than actual disparity... and it is growing between the have's and have-not's. It is not about the economic disparity alone. It is not  about the rich becoming richer and the poor becoming poorer. Socio-cultural disparity in terms of identity is the concern that I would like to bring forth here. This is an alarmingly increasing disparity and a dichotomy is being created in terms of social attitude, expectations and perceptions about life. It is this polarization in terms of thoughts and world-view of things that concerns me.

With the Internet revolution and media, the world is changing too drastically. More drastically for a country like India, where education and economy could not and is unable to keep pace because of the sheer population, diversity and vastness of the country. And of course, lack of a visionary governance.

If I compare how I used to perceive a short skirt when I was 15 years old, with a 15 year old of today, I feel like I was a pervert. Fortunately, I was part of the drastic change. I was not a mere spectator to the change. I am afraid that the majority of the Indian population are mere spectators. There are a whole lot of 15 year olds who are stuck in time and have not graduated to this new age.

We have created an atmosphere of dual societies. A dual society contains two worlds in one: the Third World and the First World coexist within the same nation, under the same authorities and the same flag. Both are disparate in terms of access to benefits of education, of employment, standard of living, media and proximity to globalization of thought processes. These societies don't understand or relate to each other.

A simple case of dual society creation is the housing development that is happening in Mumbai through the 'Slum Rehabilitation Schemes'. The builder clears the slum, makes a sub-standard multi-storeyed building with tiny rooms to accommodate the slum population, and then makes a plush building with all club amenities for selling to the rich. The plush building brings in people with no history and similarity to the local population, people whose attitudes and lifestyle is different, and mostly un-acceptable to the local population.

The above example, although dangerous, is very mild. The disparity that non-egalitarian policies regarding education, employment and media can bring, is much more swift and over-powering.

Dual societies are ticking bombs waiting for explosion. Today it is an increasing trend on rape incidents, tomorrow it would be incidents of robbery and terrorism. This is where the policy makers of India has to act. Duality in society acts as a break for change and progress. It often leads to dangerous social phenomena like we have seen in the hashtag #delhirape.

The other conclusion to draw here is that lets not make this an episode of fight between genders. In a dual society, women are not safe. Period. Even man are not safe. I have heard of a female housemaid boiling a baby in a pressure cooker. I have heard of a housemaid poisoning the entire family during dinner. I have heard of a college kid stabbed and murdered by slum neighbours when he was trying to save one girl from eve-teasing.

So believe me that it is not about gender. It is about the unequal society and wider generation gaps. Let us all be responsible citizens and do whatever we can to have an equal society in terms of thinking, attitudes, and lifestyle. The haves should control their urges and be more sensitive towards the have-nots. Similarly, have-nots need to be given opportunities to cross the barrier.

It is quite a difficult task considering that we, as a nation, are a selfish lot. We consider the Ganga as a sacred river for a holy dip, but hardly bother for the next person who is coming to take a dip. We have to start thinking as a nation, as a team.

Till then, there would be only arguments, protests and tweets.

We are a young nation but...

that hardly gives me any solace.

To me, Independence Day is a reminder of our young age as a nation. It is obvious therefore that there are so many things that are yet to be done. I feel we are running out of time.

Apart from Delhi, Mumbai and few of the other metros, private sector jobs are almost non-existent. Assam has graduates migrating into cities like Bangalore and Mumbai, staying away from their old parents, working as "Security Personnels" and other smaller jobs, for which they are over-qualified.

Youths who have decided to stay back are fighting for opportunities to make their ends meet. The economy has no market with enough demand and disposable income for any business to run profitably. Private sector investments are not forthcoming for lack of Government incentives and intent. It wont be wrong if I say that no industry is flourishing due to lack of an apt business cum economic strategy from a Govt. policy perspective.

Independence Day for them is a farce, a day perhaps to observe Assam Bandh by ULFA.

I wonder what do we do to kickstart the economic engine, which is currently polarised only in the metros. I continued my old clothes collection drive for my Bodo brothers and sisters and I end my day with satisfaction, if not happiness.

Joi Ai Axom. Jai Hind.