Indians become the bullies when it come to Africans

Indians can be the worst racists and sometimes even inhuman. Like the Americans fear the East, Orient, Muslim, Arabic or any brown-skinned person, Indians too fear people the Africans, Nigerians, Ethiopians, basically anyone belonging to Africa or with Negro descent.

No, we are loathe to admit but like the English call us curry-loving immigrants Indians too call Africans drug peddlers. Forget about going so far as Africans or Nigerians, we in India cannot seem to call the North Eastern community Indians, we even have labels for them – Chinkis. Now that we are down to labelling and name calling, there is more. Anyone who comes from the North of India becomes a Bihari and anyone to the south of Madhya Pradesh a Madrasi.

The recent incident of the death of a Nigerian national in Bengaluru, the March 28 incident where five Nigerian students were attacked by crowds in Greater Noida while another was beaten by a mob inside a shopping mall(The lead image). It shows how prone we are to labelling and herd mentality. The attacks were prompted by the death of a local teenager due to a drug overdose. His parents blame Nigerian students for giving him the drugs. Police say five people have been arrested over the attacks. And External Affairs Sushma Swaraj has promised an 'impartial' inquiry into the attacks on Nigerian students. The same assurance that foreign countries like Australia, Germany and USA give when Indians over there feel insulted or racially profiled.

The African community is not buying any of this and they have termed the incidents as "xenophobic and racial" and have insisted that they cannot see the Indian government doing anything concrete about it.

India has refused to categorise the death as ‘racial’ and why, begs a huge question.

When will we understand all Muslims are not terrorists and all Africans are not drug peddlers? Unfortunately, for the Africans, some members, because of their illegal practices and addiction to drugs have given the community a bad name. Records show that in over 100 cases of drug busts in the country at least a good 40 per cent can be traced back to people of foreign origin where the African community plays a large role.  

Same story with Indians abroad, a few of us think that it is foreign land where no one will know what mischief we are up to and we can continue the same way we behaved in Indi. So you can see Indians roughing up people, kidnapping, breaking out into fights, disobeying rules, trying to cheat our way through as they did in India, no wonder the foreigners are mistrustful of us.

The members warned that if the negative treatment and hounding continued, Indians in Africa should also expect the same treatment.

The African community is trying to put on a brave front but ultimately someone will break. In case of the incident of the death of an Ethiopian in Bengaluru, there were angry murmurs that over 1 million Indians are living in African countries, and they should fear for their safety. The members warned that if the negative treatment and hounding continued, Indians in Africa should also expect the same treatment.

So the moral of the story is, when the victim becomes the aggressor, they fail to learn from the lessons they went through. Indians must learn to do unto others as they want to be treated.

• India is racist
• racial profiling
• African community in India attacked
• Nigerians attacked in Noida
• Nigerian drug peddlers
• Nigerian deaths