Bitter experience : Nepalese eviction In Meghalaya & Assam

Baburam Poudyal

          Most of the people of VIP circle often telling that the Relation between Nepal and India is always maintaining very well and unique one. The version always does not carry the ground-reality. The relation going not only smooth way but also in a critical mood. Nepal is a small and landlocked country by two large and most populous neighbors India and China.

 

           Geography and culturally Nepal is very close to India than China. Despite, Nepal has a very glorious and sovereign history. The relation between the two lands is continuously running from ancient time. Hindu mythologies are evidence of the fact. The border between the two countries is open and people to people relation is very close and unique than the ruling class of Delhi and Kathmandu. The tussle of the two ruling classes affecting people from time to time.

 

         When I was in India I have a few very bitter experiences out of various jubilance moments as a foreign national. But, sometimes the bitterness still pinches my heart. I was residing here in the second generation and was a milk-seller, student, teacher, journalist and social activist in a different time respectively. I still heard the musical din of Lohit, the Brahmaputra River and like to remember Nilachal and Kamakhya from the lap of Mount Everest. The surroundings of Assam are not only the foundation of my thoughts but also of my life.

 

       I passed my thirty years in Assam, a beautiful and lovely Indian state of north-east. My father came here in his early teenager at the time of British India. He went to Malaya via Burma along with Britishers. Perhaps he was in service in the police there. It was the time of the Second Great War. Sometimes he used to tell us about that uneasy situation of war. During the time he resigned the service and return back to Assam. Just after he came back to Nepal and marry my mother and couple came to Assam. After a few years, we were two children of theirs. My father was a professional milk-seller in Gauhati. Later our family migrated to a remote jungle area of  Mikir Pahad to sugarcane-farming. We leave Mikir Pahad because there was not any facility for our education and we sifted to Mariyani, a town in upper Assam. The serial of migration was not stopped, we back to Diphu, ultimately we came to Gauhati, the largest city of North-east India. I have gained valuable knowledge in the lap of Assam. It was sufficient to be an Indian, especially in our case.

 

        It was 1980, Police started to suppress Nepali speaking people on the name of the illegal foreigner. It was unexpected for every Nepali living in northeastern India.  Meanwhile, anti-foreigner agitation also launched by the All Assam Student Union. The time was very hard for Nepali people. Thousands of Nepali people were detected from the state. The government was provoking local people against the Nepali community. Anti-foreigners Act was already imposed on 30 July 1976 and Northeast India was declared restricted for Nepali nationals too. Bus stands, railways stations became mainly torture spots for the Nepalese. In Shrirampur, Baxirhat check-post, hundreds of Nepalis were tortured daily.

 

         There was nothing to feel the good of Indo-Nepal relation. Indian Nepalese were also mistreated indiscriminately as foreigners. With the signing of an accord between the agitating Assam Student Union and the central government in 1984, the agitation was concluded, but suppression on Nepali people still continue in different style. My father was very disappointed about the situation. Ultimately he decided to leave Assam but I stayed a few more years.

 

       The tragedy was not only limited to Assam. The police suddenly rush in coalmine area of Jaintia Hill of Meghalaya and arrest thousands of Nepali colliery workers inhumanly in the winter of 1986. Many people were dumped near the border to go Assam. Evicted people took shelter in Nepali Mandir in Gauhati, but Assam government also deport again them to the Bengal border. Meghalaya government started check posts to check Nepalese people in Byrnihat and Maulai. Just after One year, Nepali denizens were evicted from East Khasi Hills in Meghalaya. The treaty of 1950 has not to remain unviolated.

 

       Many Indian people also may feel uneasy in Nepal. Whether the border is open on the name of good relation, People should enjoy their respect everywhere within two countries. 

  

         Nowadays I am feeling that the ruling class of both countries are not serious on the people to people relation. The only open border is not the symbol of a unique relation. The similarities of both countries offer to be a good relationship but it is to be done more.