"We are one country", the Supreme Court asserted on Tuesday while expressing concern over a recent incident in the national capital where two students from Kerala were allegedly assaulted by police and locals near the Red Fort, "coerced" to speak Hindi and ridiculed for wearing the traditional attire of the state.
A bench of justices Sanjay Kumar and Alok Aradhe observed that they were pained that people in this country were targeted because of cultural and racial differences.
The two first-year students of Delhi University's Zakir Husain Delhi College were allegedly assaulted, "coerced" to speak Hindi and ridiculed for wearing a 'lungi'.
The top court was hearing a plea filed in 2015 in the wake of a series of attacks on people from the Northeast, including the death of a student from Arunachal Pradesh, Nido Tania, in Delhi.
The court had directed the Centre to form a committee in the matter and had said the panel would be given powers for ensuring strict action in incidents of racial discrimination, racial atrocities and racial violence, and suggested measures to curb such hate and racial crimes.
During Tuesday's hearing, Additional Solicitor General KM Nataraj, appearing for the Centre, submitted that a monitoring committee has already been set up and nothing remains in the petition.
The submission was opposed by the counsel appearing for the petitioner, who argued that the incidents of racial discrimination and exclusion of Northeast people continue to occur.
The bench then told the ASG, "We read in the newspaper recently that a man from Kerala was ridiculed for wearing a lungi in Delhi. This is unacceptable in a country where people live in harmony. You should be more bothered about it. We are one country." The top court was informed by the petitioner's lawyer that the monitoring committee, which is expected to meet quarterly, has met only 14 times in 9 years.
The top court has now asked the petitioner to file a response on the status report filed by the Centre.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
