“Stop Segregating Hmar people”

Aizawl, Jul 4 : The Hmar Students’ Association (HSA) today demanded that the Government of Mizoram stop segregating the Hmar people.

In a memorandum submitted to the Mizoram government, Hmar students' body reacted to the direction of state government of Mizoram to take measures not to allot/issue house pass/site to the 'Hmar refugees'; measures to segregate them from the local population and not to issue job cards under MGNREGS to the Hmars in Mizoram and measures be taken not to enroll the Hmar refugees in the ensuing Special Revision of Electoral Roll, 2012 in Mizoram.

The memorandum stated that Vanhela Pachuau, Chief Secretary, Government of Mizoram along with officials from various departments convened a meeting on October 20, 2011 at 11:30 a.m. and derived a segregationist resolution under Memo No. D. 32020/24/2010-HMS dt. 21.11.2011, which was directed to the Hmar tribe, one of the Mizo tribes of Mizoram. According to the minutes of the meeting, R. Lalremsanga, Under Secretary to the Government of Mizoram, Home Department was directed by the government to take necessary actions against the Hmar tribe on mentioned above points.  

“The order, by ostracizing the Hmar tribe, spelt out measures to deny the community of their constitutional and citizenship rights. It stands against the rightful interests of a community whose rights and entitlement cannot be suppressed by a bias and unjust order. The insensitive order is detrimental to the unity and integration of the Mizos; it stands opposed to the collective interests of the same and negates the Hmar tribe of their fundamental rights. The assented order is parallel to the Nuremberg Laws that was dictated by Adolf Hitler under the Nazis,” said the memorandum. The memorandum further stated that the Hmar peoples cannot be “refugees” in Mizoram; and shall never be.

Taking strong exception on the govt order, the students body said that the virtue-less and ill founded political order is anti-people and undemocratic. The Hmar peoples' shall never accept the attrition and persecution that is directed to us; it is unconstitutional and despotic. The Hmar peoples' shall not be fragmented by such communal and abominable order. The abstruse order of the Home Department, Government of Mizoram amounts to a pogrom and genocide of Hmar peoples' rights. The Government of Mizoram is doggedly institutionalising injustice against the Hmar peoples' with the uncalled-for order. The memorandum signed by HSA Gen Hqrs. President Lalthlamuana Hmar and various president of  The Government of Mizoram ought to stop its “segregationist” attempt to outcast the Hmar peoples' from Mizoram, it asserted. It will remain a vain attempt and instead revive a primitive tribal phenomenon rather than a consequential political one, the HSA memo stated. The Government of Mizoram must end its segregationist commitment, further stated in the memorandum.

The students' body demanded the Home Department, Government of Mizoram to immediately abrogate and withdraw its 'inhumane order' and secure the rights and entitlement of the Hmar peoples' of Mizoram according to the Constitution of India; stop targeting the Hmar peoples' as outsiders or “Refugees”; stop segregating the Hmar peoples' and the Hmar peoples' of Mizoram be granted the rights to house pass/site, job card under MGNREGS and register in the electoral roll/census.