Non-Manipuri people shut shop during 'curfew' in Manipur

Non-Manipuri people today closed their shops and stopped business transactions during the 18-hour 'curfew' imposed by a students' committee to protest attacks on northeast people in the national capital.
Officials said shops and business establishments run by non-Manipuri people were open at the busy Thangal market complex in the heart of the capital complex in the early hours.
But they subsequently downed the shutters at Waheng Leikai, Sagolband, Nagamapal and other places in the heart of the capital complex and went indoors after learning about the 'curfew' imposed by the Joint Students' Coordinating Committee (JSCC) from 5:AM, they said.
Hair salons run by non-Manipuri people were closed all over the state, reports from the districts said.

JSCC, formed by six powerful students' bodies, has strictly asked the non-Manipuri persons to 'obey' the 'curfew', JSCC sources said.
Blaming the central and Delhi governments for their failure to protect people from the region, JSCC convenor Thangjam Premananda told reporters that it was "very shocking" that people from the northeast region were "not only ill treated but looked down" in the national capital.

The death of Nido Tania, a student from Arunachal Pradesh, the rape of a Manipuri girl, physical assault on two Manipuri youths and two girls in Delhi showed that mainland people did not take the people from this region as their own compatriots, the spokesman said.

Various social organisations, including student bodies, yesterday took out rallies in several parts of Manipur to protest against the discrimination of their people in New Delhi, official reports said today.
Reports from interior districts said people were protesting by organising sit-in protests at various places.
Chief Minister O Ibobi Singh has urged Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde to take some concrete steps to prevent racial discrimination against the northeast people, officials said.