New Delhi: “I find it difficult to differentiate between faces in Nagaland, because almost all of them look the same,” said travel vlogger Bhanwar Lal Vishnoi in a video on Nagaland. On social media, he calls himself Yatra Guru Ji and has over 6 lakh subscribers. But his videos on the Northeast, especially Nagaland, have stirred up a storm across India.
On chat groups, WhatsApp, Reddit, and other platforms, youth organisations from Nagaland, Manipur, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Sikkim, Tripura, and Assam are calling for the videos to be taken down. His critics have accused him of posting inappropriate and offensive content against tribal communities and women. He’s been called out for fetishising tribal culture, using provocative thumbnails as clickbait, and mocking cultural identity.
“He has exotified our bodies. He is not showing our culture in the videos, but selling our bodies for his views,” said research scholar Heenu Riba, who is from Arunachal Pradesh.
Across platforms, people are now arguing about the rights of tribal communities on the internet, the way marginalised groups are portrayed, and whether platforms like YouTube and Instagram should continue to remain passive against content creators dehumanising people to amass followers.
The irony is that the 27-year-old content creator from Jodhpur, Rajasthan, doesn’t understand what the fuss is all about.
“We show their culture. People expect bloggers to show original content, and I showed that. People are eating dog meat, insects there. I haven’t manipulated or done anything wrong,” he said.
In the past year and a half, he has produced more than 15 videos on Nagaland, starting from Dzuko Valley to the Kohima market.
But over the last few days, he’s been getting messages not just from people from the Northeast but tribal communities in Kashmir, Chhattisgarh, and Jharkhand.
With more than 20,000 followers on Instagram, he’s a canny content creator. His last video, however, is not a ‘field trip’ but an apology.
“Because of my greed for views, I used clickbait thumbnails. That hurt the sentiments of a lot of people, and I apologise for that,” he said in the video.
But that’s done little to stem the tide of anger.
On Reddit and Twitter, users are scrutinising his videos and questioning his use of thumbnails and captions. His thumbnails sexualise and dehumanise Naga women.
But as one user in the comments section wrote, “Sorry is not enough.”
From coaching to vlogging
Vishnoi started Yatra Guru Ji in December 2020, soon after he lost his job as an instructor in a coaching institute during the pandemic. Before that, he worked as a math teacher in a private school while he was completing his BSc, he told ThePrint.
“I was always fond of travelling. I often visited Mount Abu or Udaipur with my family,” he said.
But after he lost job and his finances took a hit, he decided to become a full-time travel blogger. His first trip was from Rajasthan to Kanyakumari, where he hitchhiked, and on some days, even walked. From there, he travelled from Kanyakumari to Kashmir, visiting villages on the route.
“I realised I could make a future as a YouTuber,” he said.
He documented his journeys, edited them, and posted the vlogs online. Initially, they got only a hundred-odd views. It didn’t take long for Vishnoi to realise that he had to find something unique to become a successful YouTuber. And that’s when he decided to focus on tribal communities.
“I had read about tribals in GK books, I wanted to see if all of that was true. I wanted to learn more,” Vishnoi said.
In February 2022, he published his first video of a tribal village featuring the Garasia tribe of Rajasthan. It got more than 35,000 views. This was just the start.
A quick scan of Vishnoi’s YouTube page will show more than 500 videos on tribal communities across India—Bastar, Kashmir, Nagaland—and even some from Bangladesh.
He presents himself as an observer. “Even if I find something dirty, I have to include it in the video.”
Vishnoi’s channel gained momentum. He even travelled with YouTuber Jyoti Malhotra, who was accused of passing sensitive information following Operation Sindoor.
“Jyoti and I went to the bordering villages of Rajasthan. You can see me in her videos and she is there in my videos too,” Vishnoi said, adding that it was Malhotra who approached him.
He also claimed that he attended the Hornbill Festival in Nagaland in 2024 with her.
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Yatra Guru Ji in Nagaland
Bhanwar Lal Vishnoi has visited Nagaland three times. He claims to be an impartial observer, an outsider who is simply showing what he sees. But the gaze is predatory. Whether it’s in Kohima market or the streets of Dimapur, he interacts with residents before giving his ‘insights’.
In a video published 11 months ago from the Dimapur market, Vishnoi explores the fruit, vegetable, and meat market. He shows fresh vegetables and then turns to show dogs, silkworms, and frogs that are exhibited for sale.
As soon as he leaves the market, he turns to the camera and says, “In Nagaland, people eat anything.” He appears disgusted.
As a “pure vegetarian”, he largely depends on dal–chawal during his travels. When he can’t find anything, he survives on biscuits.
“I had a lot of issues when I first started blogging, now I can bear it somehow,” he said.
The market video has more than 45,000 views and 800 likes on YouTube. He posted a similar video from a Kohima meat market, which garnered more than a million views and 14,000 likes. He visited the market again during his recent trip to Nagaland.
In the comments section under his videos, viewers join in to mock the Naga people.
“Nagaland is also known as little China,” read one of the comments.
Some shamed the community and its eating habits, while others praised Vishnoi for showing the truth.
“There is an audience for such content, Vishnoi is not creating this out of a vacuum. It is disgusting and vulgar,” said former TISS student Longkumer from Dimapur. “The content creators are getting bolder because there is a demand for it.”
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Normalising racism
Vishnoi’s videos have sparked a fresh debate on the racism faced by people from the Northeast. The recent Raja Raghuvanshi murder in Meghalaya triggered a fresh wave of social media hate against the people from the state and the Northeast in general.
Most of these tweets were deleted after it was discovered that Raghuvanshi’s wife Sonam was the killer.
Part of the problem is content creators like Vishnoi, who normalise racism.
“What Vishnoi posted is a justification of all the stereotypes that have already been built by mainland Indians toward Northeastern tribals,” said Heenu Riba. Women are more vulnerable to this gaze.
“They see Northeastern women as easy. They fetishise our bodies, our skin colour,” Riba said.
Hours after Vishnoi apologised, the activity on Northeast Reddit and WhatsApp groups blew up. People started identifying content creators monetising on tribal culture.
In a video published on his YouTube channel four weeks ago, vlogger Pranshu Sahu is seen hitchhiking on an Arunachali woman’s scooter. He has edited the video in a way that sexualises the woman.
The video is titled ‘Full Day-Night Enjoying With Arunachal Girl | Arunachal Girls Abused me’.
Sahu started his channel in June 2022. He has travelled to Kumbh, Shillong, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, and Kargil. His approach to these videos is similar to that of Vishnoi, where he talks to local people with a veneer of innocence and asks them for favours.
In one of his videos, he is seen hounding women even as they shy away from the camera. In another, when a family is trying to sell him khira (cucumber), he assumes they’re selling kida (insect). He laughs as he voices his confusion out loud, and they join in awkwardly.
As for Vishnoi, the YouTuber has left Nagaland for now—but he plans to visit again.
“I have not done anything wrong; I want to go back. My Nagaland brothers and sisters are angry right now, but they will forgive me eventually,” he said.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)
People seem to have lost all ethics, morals, principles and values in life.
They are not embarrassed or ashamed at consuming the meat of monkeys, snakes, frogs and other wildlife creatures.
But if somebody captures this bestiality on a camera and shows it to the world, they get offended.
Ashamed of nothing, offended by everything.
Eating dogs, snakes, insects and what not is not shameful. But if someone shows the world the truth with his camera, it becomes an issue.
I have lived long enough in the Northeast to know which communities are civilized and which are not.