The Meghalaya police and government called for calm.
Guwahati:
The Meghalaya government has appealed to all communities to maintain peace and harmony ahead of the holiday season after the powerful Khasi Student Union (KSU) put up posters on Wednesday depicting racial profiling of the Bengali community.
In the state capital, Shillong, one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the northeast, posters were posted with messages such as “All Bengalis in Meghalaya are Bangladeshis” and “Khasiland for the Khasis; foreigners are leaving.”
They were later removed by the police who tweeted: “It is reported that the banners that were displayed today in public places have been removed. We ask all interested parties to kindly cooperate with us to promote peace and harmony in the state.” .
“Whatever we do, we must not vitiate the atmosphere or disturb the peace and quiet in the state. I ask everyone not to give any common colors to any incident,” said Meghalaya Interior Minister Lahkmen Rymbui.
The incident has its roots in the Ichamati incident, where earlier this year, a KSU member was killed in clashes with non-tribal people who were mostly Bengali.
The violence erupted when KSU organized a demonstration against the Citizenship Amendment Act and in favor of the Inner Line Permit or ILP in Meghalaya in Ichamati, a small town very close to the border with Bangladesh.
One of the posters posted Wednesday mentioned the Ichamati incident and the death of the KSU member.
The general secretary of the Khasi Students’ Union, Donald Thabah, told reporters in Shillong that it was a protest against a “false narrative”.
“Recently we have had too many groups interfering in an ongoing investigation into the murder of a young man. This was our time to speak out and so we decided to protest. They tried to give it a racial and communal color. Unfounded accusations that the Christian majority are persecuting Hindu Bengalis in areas like Ichamati. The Meghalaya police issued multiple statements clarifying that there were no such problems. However, these groups were determined to spread the false narrative, “Thabah said.
“The three young men presented a memorandum to the governor of Meghalaya saying that there is persecution of Bengali Hindus and especially women in the Ichamati area. The police investigated and did not find the truth and yet they continue to spread false narratives.” He said. .
The Meghalaya government had recently denied permission to a West Bengal-based organization that wanted to visit Ichamati to see the condition of the Bengali people living there.
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