Ethnic relations in India have historically been complex. (It refers to attitudes and behaviours toward people of other
ethnicities
An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...
or
races.) India is ethnically diverse, with more than 2,000 different ethnic groups. There is also significant diversity within regions, and almost every
state
State may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State
* ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States
* ''Our S ...
and several
districts have their own distinct mixture of ethnicities, traditions, and culture. Throughout the history of India, ethnic relations have been both positive (as with mutual cultural influences) and negative (as with
discrimination against other ethnicities).
Public attitudes
Usually, people in different regions respect each other's cultures and traditions. According to local sources,
unity in diversity
Unity in diversity is used as an expression of harmony and unity between dissimilar individuals or groups. It is a concept of "unity without uniformity and diversity without fragmentation" that shifts focus from unity based on a mere tolerance ...
has been growing in India, making the country more tolerant.
In 2013,
World Values Survey
The World Values Survey (WVS) is a global research project that explores people's values and beliefs, how they change over time, and what social and political impact they have. Since 1981 a worldwide network of social scientists have conducte ...
reported 43.5% of Indians responded that they would prefer not to have neighbors of a different race. The most recent survey, however, in 2016, conducted by the World Values Survey, found that 25.6% of the people living in India would not want a person of a different race to be their neighbour.
Racism against North-East Indians in other states of India
In recent years discrimination against people from
North-East India
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has been reported. In 2007, the ''North East Support Centre & Helpline (NESC&H)'' was started as a separate wing of
All India Christian Council. Its stated goal is to increase awareness regarding prejudice and attacks against people from North-East India. Many North-Eastern Indians face discrimination; are refused living accommodations when they travel to urban areas to study; and are subjected to racial slurs in reference to the appearance of their eyes. A spokesman for the NESC&H has stated that abuse and harassment of North-Easterners is increasing.
A study from the ''North-East Support Centre & Helpline'' reported that 86% of North-East people in 2009–2010 said they faced racial discrimination in metro cities of India, based on such cultural profiling.
In 2012, in an attempt to prevent discrimination, the Indian government asked all of its states and union territories to arrest anyone who commits an act of
atrocity
Atrocity or ''Atrocities'' or ''Atrocious'' may refer to:
* Atrocity (band), a German metal band
* ''Atrocities'' (album), the fourth album by Christian Death
* Mass atrocity crimes, international crimes of genocide, war crimes, and crimes agains ...
against a North-Easterner under the
Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.
In 2014, a North-Eastern student named
Nido Taniam was
killed in New Delhi.
On 24 January 2014, two women from
Manipur
Manipur () ( mni, Kangleipak) is a state in Northeast India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. It is bounded by the Indian states of Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south and Assam to the west. It also borders two regions of ...
were assaulted and thrashed by locals at Kotla Mubarakpur,
Delhi
Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, primarily its western or right bank, Delhi shares borders ...
. They were at first hurled racial abuses but when they did not react to this, one of the accused tied the leash of his pet dog to one of the women's boots. Then she started kicking the dog away being scared that it would bite her. Then the attackers started beating her and when the other woman intervened, they dragged her out by the hair. According to them, despite being in the lane crowded with people, no one came to help them
in October 2014, there were two separate incidents, one in which a North-East student was beaten by three men in
Bangalore
Bangalore (), List of renamed places in India, officially Bengaluru (), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan area, metropolitan population of a ...
for not speaking
Kannada
Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...
, and a second where a North-East student was beaten by seven men in
Gurgaon, Haryana.
Racism in Assam and other North-Eastern States
In Assam India, there have been many attacks on those from outside the region. In 2007, thousands of
Hindi
Hindi ( Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been ...
-speaking labourers fled from Assam after a series of massacres and bomb attacks. In May 2007, nine of them were killed and another 20 injured in violent attacks. The next month, 26 people from other parts of India were killed in a series of attacks over a period of six days. The police blamed
United Liberation Front of Assam
The United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) (Assamese: সংযুক্ত মুক্তি বাহিনী, অসম) is an armed separatist organisation operating in the Northeast Indian state of Assam. It seeks to establish an indep ...
(ULFA) and the
Karbi Longri National Liberation Front for the violence. In response, the members of Purvottar Hindustani Sammelan (PHS) staged a
hunger strike
A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...
in
Dispur
Dispur (, ) is the capital of the Indian state of Assam and is a suburb at Guwahati.
It became the capital in 1973, when Shillong the erstwhile capital, became the capital of the state of Meghalaya that was carved out of Assam.
Dispur is the ...
to protest against the "merciless killings of innocent and defenceless Hindi-speaking people." Overall, 98 non-locals were killed in Assam during 2007.
In March and April 2008, a banned
Meitei outfit killed 16 non-locals in Manipur. PHS alleged that anti-social groups in Assam were carrying out a continuous hate campaign against the Hindi speakers in the region.
In May 2009, nine Hindi speakers were killed in Assam and Manipur, after the attackers set around 70 houses on fire.
During 8–10 November 2010, 21 Hindi,
Bengali
Bengali or Bengalee, or Bengalese may refer to:
*something of, from, or related to Bengal, a large region in South Asia
* Bengalis, an ethnic and linguistic group of the region
* Bengali language, the language they speak
** Bengali alphabet, the w ...
, and
Nepali speakers were killed by a faction of the NDFB in Assam.
In
Meghalaya
Meghalaya (, or , meaning "abode of clouds"; from Sanskrit , "cloud" + , "abode") is a state in northeastern India. Meghalaya was formed on 21 January 1972 by carving out two districts from the state of Assam: (a) the United Khasi Hills and J ...
, the non-indigenous people (who are collectively called ''Dkhars'') are often targets of militant groups.
[T. Haokip,]
Inter-Ethnic Relations in Meghalaya
, ''Asian Ethnicity'', 15:3, 302-316, DOI: 10.1080/14631369.2013.853545
Foreigners
In the
National Capital Region
A capital region, also called a capital district or capital territory, is a region or district surrounding a capital city. It is not always the official term for the region, but may sometimes be used as an informal synonym. Capital regions can exis ...
many African nationals have been attacked and subjected to public abuse and
racial slur
The following is a list of ethnic slurs or ethnophaulisms or ethnic epithets that are, or have been, used as insinuations or allegations about members of a given ethnicity or racial group or to refer to them in a derogatory, pejorative, or oth ...
s.
See also
*
Anti-Muslim sentiment
*
Anti-Bihari sentiment
*
Caste system in India
*
Communalism (South Asia)
Communalism is a term used to denote attempts to construct religious or ethnic identity, incite strife between people identified as different communities, and to stimulate communal violence between those groups. It derives from history, difference ...
*
Human rights in India
Human rights in India is an issue complicated by the country's large size and population as well as its diverse culture, despite its status as the world's largest sovereign, secular, democratic republic. The Constitution of India provides for Fun ...
*
National Council of Intra-Indian Relations
*
Nido Taniam
*
1991 anti-Tamil violence in Karnataka
*
2008 attacks on Uttar Pradeshi and Bihari migrants in Maharashtra
References
{{Social issues in India
Ethnic groups in India
Society of India
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...