Reform needed within to protect good name on foreign soil

Reform needed within to protect good name on foreign soil

The police have acted promptly, arresting some and filing cases against many more, in relation to the recent attack on some Nigerian students in Greater Noida, followed by another attack on a young Kenyan woman in the same locality. This is welcome, but not sufficient. Our leaders must address the rot within, which leads to these outbursts of seemingly racial violence that endanger people of African origin living in India and make mincemeat of India’s well-laid plans to win hearts on a large scale in Africa. At the root of the problem is a combination of routine failure of law enforcement, leading people to take the law into their hands, and continuing salience of group identities in India’s collective life, reinforced by the kind of politics large political parties practice.
India has been trying to woo Africa, widely recognised as the next high-growth region of the world, waiting to graduate from export of commodities to higher forms of value addition as the mainstay of economic growth. India has major programmes of foreign assistance, a $10 billion line of credit, 50,000 scholarships for students from African countries to study in India, periodic Africa summits and much else, to forge partnerships with the region.
All that stands threatened, with frequent bouts of violence targeting people of African origin living and studying in India. True, there have been several instances of foreign nationals’ involvement in undesirable activities, including the smuggling and peddling of drugs. These have to be dealt with firmly and if a pattern of such offences is associated with any particular nationality, the concerned government must be apprised of the fact and its cooperation sought in reversing the trend.
The bigger challenge is to address the dynamics of India’s own sociopolitical practice that lead people to see crime and punishment in terms of groups. If a member of a particular group does some wrong, Indian politicians are used to mobilising people to attack that group as a whole, not just the individual offender. The point is to end this practice, for our sake inside and outside the country.