New Delhi: Over rice beer and pork at Freedom Corner restaurant in Humayunpur, 30 students from the Northeast set aside loyalty to clan, tribe, village, and state. Instead, they bonded over their shared experience of Delhi’s prejudice against people from the Northeast.
But it was a dinner with an agenda. All the students are members of the Northeast Students Society Delhi University (NESSDU)—an unprecedented coalition that came together to urgently bridge the gap between the people of the seven Northeastern states and the rest of India.
Founded in 2012, NESSDU came into its own in a climate of fear, anger, and bloodshed following the racially motivated murder of a student from Arunachal Pradesh in 2014. For the first time, there was a police and political consensus to back the initiative. Since then, it has expanded from eight Delhi University colleges in the north campus to 57 across the capital city, with over 2,000 members and annual elections to bring in new leaders. Most importantly, it became a safe space for students from the Northeast facing verbal slurs and everyday harassment.
“This is our family,” said its general secretary, Dampi Hiri from Arunachal Pradesh, as the group discussed plans to tackle prejudice among landlords, push for stronger police response to racial attacks, and organise the union’s upcoming sports event.
Clan-based identities are sometimes mentioned during elections to attract votes, but NESSDU represents the collective identity of the NE region. Joining NESSDU got me socially, politically, and culturally closer to other NE states
-Saveio Khole, former NESSDU president and BJYM leader
This year, for the first time, NESSDU got a woman president. Harshita Bairagi from Assam was elected in October, telling supporters that her priority was to give NESSDU and Northeastern culture greater visibility in Delhi University.
But NESSDU is also navigating a bigger shift in its own identity. It’s recalibrating its approach and reintegrating smaller states like Mizoram and Sikkim into its ruling council. Most significantly, it’s distancing itself from politics.
The shift began in 2019 when its elected council amended its constitution to ban members from joining any political party or student body like the Congress-backed National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) or the RSS-affiliated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).
This, however, has come at a cost. NESSDU is losing its social, cultural, and political currency within Delhi University’s campuses. Without political clout, its members are grappling with a host of problems, from lack of funds to inactive intra-college cells. With no money coming in, cultural events have dropped drastically from 30 in 2014 to barely two a year. The politics ban has also caused NESSDU to drift away from the Delhi University Students Union (DUSU).
For some founding student members as well as professors from the Northeast, it’s a necessary correction.
“I had dissociated myself from the student society,” said Prof Naorem Santakrus Singh, head of Hindu College’s physics department and the man who took the first steps to establish NESSDU. He stepped away from the society when it started prioritising politics over student welfare, but is now heartened by the changes taking place.
“It was created with the idea to cushion students coming to the city for the first time, but after 2014, the organisation became politicised by political student wings like the ABVP or the NSUI,” said Santakrus, who is from Manipur.
But many see this depoliticisation as a setback, stripping NESSDU of any real power to bring about positive change.
With funds drying up, NESSDU has also had to scale down its activities, including its annual sports event, which will be held early next year.
“We should have our annual sports event at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium,” said one student at Freedom Corner restaurant. The others laughed.
“Do you think that NESSDU can afford anything except the Delhi Police main ground to conduct its annual sports event, now?” replied another student. “We do not have lakhs in our pocket anymore.”
As NESSDU’s status grew, so did its political impact. Council members began aligning with larger student unions like the NSUI and ABVP. For some, NESSDU became a launchpad for a career in state or national politics.
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From clans to a collective
Nagaland House was abuzz with activities on 26 October. Women wearing Naga shawls, tribal skirts, dak manda (lungis), and beaded necklaces gathered on the lawn, waiting for the results of the recently concluded council election. But the real excitement was about something bigger — the Northeast Student Society Delhi University was getting a female president for the first time ever.
Both candidates for the top seat were women. Students said it was no grand plan, no conscious push — it happened organically. The men were running for other posts.
The two opponents, Harshita Bairagi and Mahachoni Yanthan, clasped each other’s hands, their eyes screwed shut, as they waited for the results. Within seconds, the pin-drop silence erupted into a resounding roar. Harshita Bairagi, a third-year political science student from DU’s Zakir Hussain College, had won. She is now the society’s first democratically elected female leader to represent the seven Northeast sister states and one brother state of Sikkim.
Bairagi’s transition from Assam to Delhi in 2022 wasn’t easy. She recalls being racially ‘othered’ on her very first day in the city.
“I went to Chandni Chowk to buy bedsheets. The shopkeepers started speaking loudly with each other about where I could be from,” said Bairagi.
This “otherness” followed her everywhere. Snide remarks about her dressing style when she’d wear traditional attire like a mekhala-chador, or casual requests to cook momos at home became routine. She’s stopped being surprised.
Now, she’s ready to revitalise the union.
“I want to expand NESSDU from only sports and culture to other aspects of the Northeast, like politics, environment and medicine. We also want to get recognised by DUSU.”
Her elected council includes members from every Northeast state–Sikkim, Assam, Manipur, Nagaland, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, and Tripura. This system of full representation was only introduced in 2022. Before this, states like Assam, Manipur and Nagaland would dominate.
Every instance of verbal racial assault in public breaks some of my confidence. You cannot wait for a rape to happen.
-Dampi Hiri, newly elected NESSDU general secretary
But unity isn’t guaranteed. The violence that erupted last year in Manipur between the Meitei people and the Kuki-Zo tribe has put it to the test. The brutality of the clashes sparked fears that the conflict could spill into Delhi, said Santakrus. But from the word go, NESSDU’s senior members stepped in, coordinating peaceful dialogue sessions between Kuki and Meitei students. Similar tensions among student groups from different states are also addressed with empathy and alacrity.
“Communal strife must not harm the integrity of the Student Fraternity at Delhi University or anywhere else. We must protest our social fabric around unity,” reads the official statement of NESSDU on its Instagram page.
As the new president, Bairagi will have to work with hundreds of small clan unions like the All Bodo Student Union, Naga Student Union, Delhi Nyishi Student Union, Galo Ao, and so on. NESSDU acts as a bridge between these groups and the DU administration, represents their interests, and ropes them in for events. It also keeps channels of communication open between groups that are clashing back home.
Every year, villages in the Northeast crowdfund and send a few of their children to Delhi to study. These students form village-based unions, and the NESSDU coordinates with them as well.
“Back home, our clan or tribal identity is stronger,” said Biswajit Narzar, an Assamese student and president of the Delhi unit of the All Bodo Student Union (ABSU). “But here in Delhi, we all feel stronger as Northeasterners.”
Modest beginnings—and a murder
For decades, students from the Northeast arrived in Delhi with little more than handwritten directions and hope. They struggled with finding a place to live, college bureaucracy, and culture shock.
It was to address such problems that the idea of a united Northeast student front in Delhi came to Santakrus back in 2011.
As DU’s deputy dean of student welfare, he was privy to the problems of newcomers from the Northeast. His solution was simple but ambitious: build a student network for students from the region. Not a loose social club, but a formal body with real influence. He started sending letters to colleges across DU, asking them to set up Northeast student cells with one faculty member in charge. While the response from most colleges was positive, some like LSR, SRCC, and Khalsa were not enthused.
Their reasoning, according to Santakrus, was that a separate body for Northeast students would divide the student body on regional lines and undermine the “unity of the nation”.
“A few mean-minded officials did not understand that the Northeast is geographically cut off from the rest of the mainland and has a history of disturbances. And so, unionisation is important,” said Santakrus.
Undeterred, he created a database for all NE students studying at DU. By 2012, the NESSDU constitution was formulated, guaranteeing equal representation for all Northeast states. It said a council of eight student members would be responsible for representing NE students of all DU colleges to the administration and authorities—although this was put in practice only a decade later.
At first, NESSDU’s goals were small — helping tribal students relocate to Delhi and assisting them in getting admissions in DU colleges under the ST (Scheduled Tribe) category.
Then the murder of Nido Tania, a 20-year-old from Arunachal Pradesh, changed everything.
On 29 January 2014, he was fatally beaten by shopkeepers in Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar. It began with shopkeepers allegedly mocking his hairstyle and ended with him dying in a hospital of lung and brain injuries.
Nido wasn’t just any student. He was the son of Arunachal Congress leader Nido Pavitra. The Northeast erupted. Delhi was in turmoil. Students poured into the streets carrying banners demanding justice.
The police faced severe criticism for delaying filing an FIR and mishandling the investigation. And the issue of discrimination against Northeast students took centre stage. The matter even reached the Lok Sabha, which passed a unanimous resolution condemning the killing.
“The death of a Northeast student in New Delhi after being beaten up is barbaric and condemnable,” the late senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley tweeted. Manmohan Singh, then Prime Minister, also condemned it.
The backlash led to a wave of reforms. Delhi police launched a helpline for Northeastern residents and seven lawyers were empanelled by the Delhi State Legal Services Authority to provide free legal assistance to people from the Northeast. The Home Ministry also set up a Special Police Unit for North East Region (SPUNER) to support Northeastern residents in the city. Following the recommendations of the Bezbaruah Committee, the government even proposed a new section in the Indian Penal Code to make racial slurs a non-bailable offence—although this remained on paper.
On the campus front, the Human Resource Development Ministry ordered central universities to set up active Northeast cells in every college, with a faculty member from the region in charge. For NESSDU, which was still finding its footing across Delhi University’s campuses, this was the turning point.
Between 2014 and 2019, NESSDU was actively involved in several high-profile movements, including anti-CAA-NRC protests, demonstrations against the Environmental Protection Act (1986) amendments, and agitations over violence on JNU’s campus.
Growing political heft
By 2014, NESSDU had conducted its first democratic elections and quickly emerged as a strong and influential student body at Delhi University.
“Unlike any other student organisation, NESSDU had connections with the Northeast cells of each college. That is why it was influential and unignorable by DUSU,” said Subrata Bora, a former student convener for over 50 independent Northeast student unions that operated across DU before NESSDU’s formation.
As it grew in status, political parties began to court NESSDU, keen to show their solidarity with the Northeast. Council members started enjoying influence in many colleges, gained access to DUSU executives and administrators, and even conferred with leaders like former Mizoram Chief Minister Zoramthanga.
As the body’s status grew, so did its political impact. Council members began aligning with larger student unions like the NSUI and ABVP. For some, NESSDU became a launchpad for a career in state or national politics.
That’s how Saveio Khole, then a commerce student from Manipur, found his calling. He became the first democratically elected president of NESSDU in 2014-15, immediately after the Nido Tania incident.
Almost overnight, Khole went from being an outsider in the capital city to the single voice representing thousands of Northeastern students. By the time he graduated in 2016, he had built connections with youth leaders from both local and national political parties.
“During my time, we had very good relations with DUSU. They would help us book halls on campus to conduct our cultural events,” said Khole. “I’m from Manipur, but because of NESSDU, I got to know students from other states like Assam, Arunachal, and Nagaland.”
When he returned to Manipur in 2016, the BJP, which was expanding its presence in the Northeast, welcomed him into its fold. He is now a vice-president in the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM), the BJP’s youth wing, and sits on Manipur’s Airport Advisory Committee.
“Clan-based identities are sometimes mentioned during elections to attract votes, but NESSDU represents the collective identity of the NE region,” he told ThePrint. “Joining NESSDU got me socially, politically and culturally closer to other NE states.”
The rise and rise of NESSDU
With NESSDU’s growing political affiliations, funds started pouring in.
“During the NESSDU elections, we used to receive funds from either of the two giant student organisations [ABVP and NSUI]. Subsequently, they would form a panel each to contest elections,” said Varun Pradhan, a Manipuri student who served as NESSDU’s general secretary from 2019 to 2021.
The money was used to host cultural events across campuses and cement NESSDU’s presence within Delhi University. They organised dance competitions, open mics, debates, music shows, and food festivals, booking spacious halls to accommodate large crowds. In 2019, NESSDU decorated the entire Delhi Police auditorium with roses and chrysanthemums to host over 3,000 students from various universities for a civil service preparation counselling session. It was one of many events the society put together almost every month.
By this point, NESSDU had found its voice—not just on campus but on prime-time news. The protests around the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and National Register of Citizens (NRC) propelled the society into the thick of Delhi politics.
Between 2014 and 2019, NESSDU was actively involved in several high-profile movements, including anti-CAA-NRC protests, demonstrations against the Environmental Protection Act (1986) amendments, and agitations over violence on JNU’s campus. Their activism took many forms — social media campaigns, public demonstrations, crowd-funding drives, and sit-ins. They also used their platform to press DU’s administration for change. Their demands included stronger Northeast cells in all colleges, scrapping compulsory Hindi language papers for bachelor’s students, and adding more chapters on Northeast culture in the syllabus.
A few mean-minded officials did not understand that the Northeast is geographically cut off from the rest of the mainland and has a history of disturbances. And so, unionisation is important
-Prof Naorem Santakrus Singh, one of NESSDU’s founders
“Often, colleges would only form an NE cell for namesake because it improves their NIRF (National Institutional Ranking Framework) ranking. NESSDU tried to bring to life many such inactive, sleeping NE cells,” said Khachuk Deberma from Tripura.
In 2019, when she joined Lady Shri Ram College for Women (LSR) in 2019 to study English Literature, she found that it didn’t have an active Northeast society. That’s when Deberma and her friends drafted a proposal to establish one in LSR.
“The principal rejected the proposal, stating that it could cause groupism within the college. This created a tiff between the NE students and the college administration,” said Deberma. With support from NESSDU seniors, she lodged a police complaint citing Standing Order No. 383/2012, which enforces a zero-tolerance policy against racial discrimination.
NESSDU tried to get the police to intervene and help NE students form a union in the college. But nothing came of it.
“And why would anyone take a few women from the Northeast seriously?” said Deberma, who went on to serve as an executive member of NESSDU from 2020 to 2021.
Where NESSDU did have more success was in supporting and representing the interests of smaller tribal and clan-based groups, like the Delhi Chakma Student Union (DCSU), a body for students from the Chakma tribe.
“Some of our members are also part of NESSDU, which is a space for unity amongst all states and clans of the Northeast,” said Malani Chakma, president of DCSU.
Depoliticised and defanged by COVID
Within the NESSDU, not everyone was happy with its political trajectory. This discontent played out in the 2019 elections. A student panel not supported by any political party or affiliated students’ union defeated the NSUI-backed panel.
After the victory, the new council decided to amend the body’s constitution, barring any members from being associated with any political organisation or student outfit. Another amendment barred students with back papers (pending exam reappearances) from contesting elections. To broaden representation, two new posts — joint secretary (east) and joint secretary (west) — were added to the council, allowing off-campus colleges like Kalindi and Janki Devi Memorial to have a presence in NESSDU.
The council also introduced a rule ensuring that no Northeast state would be left unrepresented. It stipulated that one person would be inducted “from those states whose member are not elected in the presently constituted Executive Council”.
But with the ban on political affiliations, the funds stopped coming in, and cultural events and meets dropped sharply. A few months later, COVID-19 swept through the world and almost all student union activities came to a halt. Some of the students returned to their home states, and those who remained in Delhi found themselves at a loss.
“The Northeast cells in many colleges disappeared or simply became inactive,” said Varun Pradhan, a Manipuri student who served as NESSDU’s general secretary from 2019 to 2021. As a result, the body lost its influence over college administrations. Covid also put a halt to the society’s annual exercise of democratic elections.
Meanwhile, new problems cropped up. As classrooms transitioned online, bullying and racism also found their way into these virtual spaces.
“We used to receive many cases of online bullying of freshers on WhatsApp groups. But because the college cells could not support the students, pressure could not be put on the administration to take action,” said Pradhan.
Weakened by the lockdown, smaller societies and student organisations met with a similar fate.
Students told ThePrint that even when they tried to mobilise demonstrations and protests, college administrations shut them down under the garb of ‘health and safety’ measures.
A decade into its formation, NESSDU is diminished. This year, the election turnout was 800, compared to pre-COVID years when as many as 1,700 students came out to vote.
For many Northeast students at DU, having NESSDU representatives just a call away has been a lifeline.
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Fighting for safety & support
Back at Nagaland House, Dampi Hiri, a third-year student from Indraprastha College of Women celebrated her election as NESSDU’s new general secretary. Her manifesto includes mental health workshops, especially for women. She also wants more women to become active in the union and lead cells in college campuses.
Hiri hopes to turn some of her harrowing experiences into change. Last winter, while buying corsets and tank tops with her friends at Sarojini Nagar market, a group of shopkeepers started calling them ‘foreigners’.
“Every instance of verbal racial assault in public breaks some of my confidence,” said the 20-year-old student from Arunachal Pradesh. “You cannot wait for a rape to happen.”
Data from 2014-17 shared by former SPUNER chief Robin Hibu revealed that 239 ‘heinous crimes’ (rape, murder, abduction etc) were committed against women from the Northeast. Another 343 cases of ‘minor’ crimes, such as harassment and racial slurs, were also recorded. South Delhi recorded the highest number of cases, with Mahipalpur, Katwaria Sarai, Mukherjee Nagar, and Gandhi Vihar identified as ‘hot spots’.
For many Northeast students at DU, having NESSDU representatives just a call away has been a lifeline.
“Last year, an e-rickshaw hit two women in North Delhi. The girls immediately contacted NESSDU, which handled everything from the police to the medical needs of the students,” said Bonit Naorem, a former student of Zakir Husain College who recalled facing racist slurs during his time there.
NE women are stalked, trafficked, and exploited inside corporate workplaces. Students are racially abused and assaulted because they are new to the city. Even today, renting flats to Northeasterners does not come as easy to North Indians
-IPS officer Robin Hibu
Like him, almost every student from the Northeast can recount at least one experience of racial harassment in Delhi. One key reason NESSDU became such a powerful student organisation was its direct relationship with the Special Police Unit for the North Eastern Region, or SPUNER, established after the death of Nido Tania.
With the backing of this police unit, NESSDU and other student unions had a safety net.
In 2015, Sangeeta Pradhan, who comes from Manipur, was a hotel management student at IIHM Badarpur. She recalled how police would often turn them away instead of helping. One night at 10, she received a call from a student from Darjeeling who had been waylaid at a Gurgaon mall by a man who had been stalking her for two months.
“He slapped her in front of us and threatened to throw acid on her face,” said Pradhan, now 34. When the women finally made it to the nearest police station, the cops on duty refused to file a formal complaint. It took the intervention of a senior-level SPUNER inspector for the FIR to be filed.
“The girl was traumatised. She did not step outdoors for three straight months. As she had no family here, I decided that she should live with me during the police investigation and court hearings,” said Pradhan.
Police, prejudice & ‘patriotism’ on trial
SPUNER’s scope extends beyond students from the Northeast. It also serves people from Ladakh and Gorkhas from Darjeeling residing in Delhi. The unit was built by IPS officer Robin Hibu, who is currently posted as DGP at the Delhi Police headquarters.
“Northeast student unions inside Delhi increase the strength of the police by being present at times and places when we cannot,” said Hibu. Organisations like NESSDU serve as interlocutors bridging the gap between police and students.
Born and brought up in Arunachal Pradesh, the IPS officer understands the kind of discrimination students from the Northeast face — because he lived it. As a student in Delhi, he was abused verbally, and people kicked his aluminium trunk while he was waiting for a bus at Kashmiri Gate. He had to hide in a public toilet near the bus depot until morning, when it was safe to come out.
“This happened because mainlanders did not know, or care to know, about my Apatani tribe of Arunachal Pradesh,” said Hibu.
More than 20 years later, when SPUNER was formed, Hibu realised that nothing had changed.
“NE women are stalked, trafficked, and exploited inside corporate workplaces. Students are racially abused and assaulted because they are new to the city. Even today, renting flats to Northeasterners does not come as easy to North Indians,” he said.
To address such issues, Hibu started initiatives to support northeastern communities in Delhi. SPUNER introduced concessions for NE patients in select hospitals, and Hibu organised meetings with student unions, taxi drivers, teachers, nurses, and other professional groups to sensitise them about the Northeast.
There are approximately 9 to 10 lakh Northeastern people living in Delhi, according to Hibu. Without political representation, they are often overlooked. That’s why, he says, having Northeast unions — big or small — is so important. Today, SPUNER, now headed by IPS officer PN Khrimay, has around 90 police staff on its rolls and operates a dedicated 24/7 helpline — 1093.
But even with SPUNER’s presence and the work of Northeast unions, questions of identity and belonging keep coming up. Despite being citizens of India, many Northeasterners in Delhi are forced to ‘prove’ their nationality — sometimes with ID documents, sometimes through sheer insistence. Asserting their Indianness is a constant, exhausting battle.
“Often, people from the Northeast rely on Aadhaar cards to make people believe that we are Indians,” said Saveio Khole. “But people from the Northeast are more patriotic than mainlanders. Unlike them, we are more aware of what regions constitute India.”
(Edited by Asavari Singh)
The irony is not lost on anyone.
When mainland Indians visit the north-east, either as tourists or because of job postings, they experience first-hand the deeply entrenched racism and hatred from the native tribes. The tribal societies of rhe north-east are xenophobic by default and this results in frequent instances of violence targeting “outsiders” (i.e. non-tribals).
The very same tribals, when visiting mainland India, either as tourists or students or professionals, decry racism targeted at them. They portray themselves as saints of non-violence and progressive values. Yet a short visit to their home state would expose their lies and deceit.