New Delhi: The heartbreak was final. When the first residents of Jawaharlal Nehru University’s Barak Hostel moved in on 19 May, Northeast students, who had been fighting for reservation, realised they had lost the fight.
“It is about going back on promises. It is about not really listening to us, about disrespecting our voices,” said PhD student Yaari from Arunachal Pradesh, who ran for the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union election this year as an independent candidate, but didn’t win. “Nothing can be done now. Students have already occupied the rooms, Northeastern students won’t get their rights.”
For almost a decade, Northeast students were waiting for the inauguration of the Barak Hostel, named after a river that flows through Manipur, Nagaland, Mizoram, and Assam. It was supposed to be a hostel for them, envisaged after the murder of Nido Tania, a 19-year-old student from Arunachal Pradesh, in Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar area in 2014 that led to widespread protests in the Capital.
Barak was supposed to be their safe space. A place where they could live their life without racism or being shunned for the food they ate. What makes the betrayal all the more painful is that Barak Hostel was constructed using funds from the North Eastern Council. For now, students have no plans to fight this battle in court.
“We are trying our best to avoid taking the legal route. It will be challenging for us as a student body functioning without any financial support. It may also prove to be futile if the ruling isn’t in our favour. After that, the administration can make student life difficult,” Anna, a doctorate student from Manipur, said.
They didn’t find support from student bodies either, which argued that region-wise hostel allotment would lead to the “ghettoisation” of Northeast students.
“Who are they (JNUSU) to tell us that our demand would lead to ghettoisation? This is very patronising,” said Anna. “They’re not treating us like actual adults, but like whining children.”
Students let down
Joel, from Mizoram, has been living in a dormitory for the last seven months. He was waiting for space at the Barak Hostel, but that dream ended when the list of allotments was released on 14 May. His name was not on it.
He was among the Northeast students who had participated in the 7 April protest demanding 75 per cent reservation in the newly built hostel. The protests ended after the Dean of Students, Manuradha Chaudhary, gave a verbal assurance that they would be given priority allotment if not reservation.
“Our demand was and remains getting our rightful reservation in the hostel. But we broke off our protests when the Dean of Students offered us priority allotment, but even that didn’t happen,” Yaari said. She claimed only three Northeast students had received allotment in the hostel.
Northeastern students, including Joel, had also submitted applications to the dean’s office demanding they either be shifted to the Barak Hostel or get an allotment there.
“When the list came out, my name wasn’t there,” Joel, a first-year German studies student, said. On 23 May, in a fortuitous turn of events, he was informed by JNUSU that he will be getting space at the Barak Hostel. Other students have not been that lucky.
Many have resigned themselves to their current accommodations.
“We just look different racially, it cannot be denied, it’s in front of you. So we do face some form of discrimination over it,” Yaari said.
One main bone of contention is their local food, like stews that include fermented fish and smoked meat. According to Anna, they are unable to access it because ‘mainland’ students might find it stinky.
According to the North East Students’ Forum, JNU, in 2018, a mess secretary of Chandrabhaga Hostel, another hostel on campus, had proposed a dish of chicken cooked with bamboo shoots. But it got strong opposition from other students.
“We cannot deny the fact that food is political as it is the basis for so many instances of racial discrimination faced throughout the city, even country. The racial stereotyping of the kind of food consumed by those from the region (Northeast), along with the complete rejection by certain casteist persons based on its “purity”, makes the need for a kitchen adhering to these specific more essential,” the North East Students’ Forum wrote on their Instagram page.
According to Anna and Yaari, to have access to northeastern food, students from the region must have a dedicated hostel.
Also read: This JNU student is deleting social media posts in panic. ‘Don’t know what will offend US’
The journey to Barak
In 2016, JNU had signed a memorandum of understanding with the North Eastern Council on construction of the Barak Hostel at a cost of Rs 28 crore. Politicians hailed it as a great achievement. It was celebrated in posters with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s photo when the foundation stone laying ceremony was announced in 2017. Padmanabha Acharya, then-Governor of Nagaland, had visited the campus and planted a sapling near the Barak Hostel.
The hostel was e-inaugurated by Home Minister Amit Shah in February 2024, with pomp and show, and chest thumping by politicians, flaunting the milestones they had achieved for the Northeast students. Union ministers, including Kiren Rijiju and G Kishan Reddy, hailed it as an exemplary achievement of the Prime Minister.
“Bridging the gap & providing quality & accessible education to the youth of North East! …With a capacity to accommodate 446 students, the North Eastern Council supported project reflects the commitment & dedication of @narendramodi govt to create better opportunities & build bright future for the Yuva Shakti,” Reddy had tweeted last year in February.
For a year after its inauguration, the hostel wasn’t operational. The JNUSU staged a 17-day hunger strike demanding the hostel be opened immediately. There were demonstrations by the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) as well.
The hostel building was finally inaugurated on 7 April by JNU Vice-Chancellor Santishree Dhulipudi Pandit along with Sherry Lalthangzo, Economic Adviser to the North Eastern Council. At the inauguration, Pandit even thanked the donors, NEC, for funding the Barak hostel. And then he said:
“Like other hostels at JNU, Barak Hostel will be accommodating students from all across the country as JNU is a national university where inclusivity and multiculturalism is cherished”.
And the Northeast student community was shattered.
“You cannot gain political mileage on the struggles of the northeastern students, make these promises, take money in our name and then take a step back,” Anna said.
(Edited by Aamaan Alam Khan)