One of the victims was seriously injured in the leg, hand and face and has been hospitalized. To add insult to the injury, the police have also reportedly refused FIR under the SC/ST Atrocity Prevention Act.

According to the NE helpline, the incident happened at around 2.30 AM on December 12, 2008 when the landlord, in a drunken state entered the room rented to two Manipuri girls just two days earlier. The two were molested them. Following this, the girls informed the north east community leaders of Gurgaon. The community leaders rushed to the spot to help them. However, the landlord and his son mobilized neighbors and severely assaulted them, the center today informed.

The matter was reported to the local police station while the victim who suffered the most was taken to a local hospital. Both the girls said to belong to the tribal communities of Manipur. North East Support Centre & Helpline today informed that it had spoken to the in-charge of the case, Sub-Inspector of Police Aberaj. The police officer, however, refused to register the case even till filing this report. “Aberaj intentionally refused to register the case under the Prevention of SC/ST Atrocity Act 1995. Victim from hospital bed reports to NE Helpline that, Aberaj refused to take the SC/ST Atrocity Prevention Act section in written complaint” the center said. .

The center’s spokesperson Madhu Chandra had to approach the Additional Deputy Commissioner of Gurgaon to look into the matter and the commissioner is reported to have assured that appropriate action will be taken against the landlord and his son. “The sexual and racial harassment to North East communities was reduced after NE Helpline came forward to help the victims but after the gap of 10 months, sexual harassment to North East girls is reported again” the center lamented.

North East Support Centre & Helpline (www.nehelpline.net) is a combined initiative of various human rights activists, social workers, students, journalists and lawyers seeking to prevent harassment and abuse meted out to women, North East people and tribal communities of different states.

Defeated in both the constituencies and left with just three seats in a House of 40, this chief architect of the Mizo Accord on the side of the then underground Mizo National Front (MNF) is now the most disturbed person.

“We had never imagined that our party would suffer such a major setback. Losing elections is one thing, but losing in this manner with just three seats in hand is definitely shocking,” said a senior MNF leader. Zoramthanga, for one, has agreed that it was an anti-incumbency wave that had worked silently against the regional party. “The anti-incumbency factor led to our defeat,” he said in Aizawl, refusing to admit there was any corruption during his rule as alleged by the Congress.

For Zoramthanga, CM for 10 consecutive years, the longest continuous stint in the tiny state, it was also the first-ever defeat at the individual level since he returned from the jungles to join the Indian political mainstream. First elected to the Assembly in 1987, it was only this time that he has tasted defeat.

Though Zoramthanga and his party claim it was the anti-incumbency factor that led to their defeat, much of the credit must also go to both the Congress as well as the three-party United Democratic Alliance (UDA); the Congress for having really driven home the point that Mizos were yearning for change, and the UDA for having caused massive erosion in the MNF base.

The MNF did put in its best efforts to woo voters by providing free rice to every BPL family in the name of famine management. But what it did not understand is the changing behaviour of the voters, especially the younger people, all born after the Mizo Accord of 1986 and after Mizoram attaining full statehood a year later. It was in fact this chunk of voters who did not find anything worthwhile in the free rice; the young educated lot wanted jobs and income-generating engagements. Thus, while the older generation of Mizos found the UDA candidates handy to shift their votes, the new generation of voters picked up from Rahul Gandhi the mantra called change. Ten years was probably too long a period for them to keep watching the same face. (Agencies)

Abin from Peren edged out 12 contenders to be crowned Miss Nagaland, 2008 at a gala event on Saturday night here on the penultimate day of the annual Hornbill festival.

Among 13 contestants, who had earlier won the district-level beauty titles, Nyeie Leinak Phom from Longleng and Chumlano Kikon bagged the first and second runners-up titles.

The event, organised annually by the Beauty and Aesthetic Society of Nagaland and sponsored by the Nagaland government, has become one of the main attractions of the weekly Hornbill festival which came to an end on Sunday evening.

There has been a phenomenal growth in the number of Sikkim-bound tourists, who have given a preference to the state over the Darjeeling hills, ever since the Gorkhaland stir resurfaced.

S B S Bhaduria, state’s tourism secretary, said, everything in Sikkim — be its natural resources like mountains, lakes, waterfalls and other scenic places and the cultural life of the people and their lifestyle including cuisine — would be exploited to make tourism a round-the-year phenomenon.

The tourism department, in cooperation with other government agencies, has been working on a plan to build infrastructure like roads, hospitality, etc and development of a large pool of manpower to promote village tourism, hydro tourism, adventure sports and eco-tourism.

Bhaduria said the state government has enough funds at its disposal to develop tourism-related infrastructure. The Centre had also chipped in with generous financial allocation.

Bhaduria hoped that tourist earnings would become a major revenue component of the state in the years to come. He singled out adventure sports to emerge as the potential major revenue-earner in a couple of years, with events like para-gliding, water rafting and mountain biking hogging the attention of high-end tourists.

State Home Minister HS Lyngdoh said the process to raise the squad would start immediately.

“With the state police facing a crisis of personnel and SOTs, we are committed to raising a special commando force at the earliest. The commando force would be given intensive training on arms, operational tactics (anti-terrorist) and food habits,” the home minister said.

Lyngdoh said the state, besides utilizing its resources, would seek funds and modern sophisticated weapons for the force from the Centre.

Initially, the force would have at least 100 commandos and later the number would be increased depending on funds and manpower.

The decision was taken at a high-level security meeting convened by Chief Minister Donkupar Roy last evening.

The meeting also discussed the issue of state facing shortage of members of special operations team (SOT) as most of the SOT men who belong to the third IRBN battalion were taken to Delhi for VIP duties.

The government decision came a day after an SOT personnel and the “commander-in-chief” of rebel group Liberation Achik Elite Force (LAEF) were killed in an encounter at Dimit village near Shahlang, West Khasi Hills. PTI

Miss Aartina, who aspires to take up mass communication, also won the Miss beautiful smile title as well during the various sub-titles contest.

This talented teenage girl from Kwakeithel in Imphal west district went home richer with a cash prize of Rs 50,000 which was handed over by Manipur Horticulture and Tribal development minister DD Thaisii.
Her companion and a student of Liberal College, Luwangsangbam in Imphal Grace Kamei, a resident of Marangjei near Noney town bagged the first runner up title while gorgeous Soibam Italy, a resident of Manipur Chief Minister O Ibobi’s native Thoubal district bagged the second runner up title. Miss Italy was also this year’s first runner up title holder in Miss Kut Contest held on November 1 last.

Tamenglong MLA and Vice-Chairman of the Hill Areas Committee Khangthuanang Panmei and Tamei MLA Awangbow Newmai handed over their cash prizes of Rs 30,000 and Rs 20,000 during the occasion.
Other beauties who got the various subtitles during the night long ‘brain and beauty’ test included A Diana - Miss Photogenic, Anupama Heikham - Miss Congeniality, Yumnam Rangita - Miss Catwalk, Lily Lamhoijang - Miss beautiful hair, Athing Newmai - Miss beautiful eyes.

Braving the chill and windy winter weather at the dusty local ground of this picturesque hill station till late midnight yesterday, a panel of judges including two ladies working in diverse fields scrutinized them through three rounds of walk - traditional, casual and formal on the ramp.
Highlights of the much awaited evening included a rock music show led by Jengam and Alvina Gonson, a sequence of dances by the local youths and artistes of Manipur film academy.

The presence of Manipur’s prominent celebrities including Danny and Kamala during the Orange Queen show happened to be another crowd puller of the night as they shared their acting dialogue and songs sequences to the responsive Tamenglong audience.

Though the first ever Orange festival was held to promote Orange growers of Tamenglong in 2001, the Orange Queen contest was introduced in 2003 after the festival become a state level fest in the same year.

Diatribe from Nagaland was placed second and pocketed a neat Rs 1.5 lakh while Eximious again from Nagaland was accorded the third position to win Rs 1 lakh.

The individual prizes worth Rs 25,000 each were: Best Vocalist - Lui Tzudir of Original Fire Factor (OFF) Nagaland, Best Lead Guitarist - Zeptha of Maestro ( Assam ); Best Drummer - Shaun Morehead of The Verbs (Meghalaya) and Best Bassist - Lezo of Eximious (Nagaland). A total of nine bands - Verbs (Meghalaya), OFF (Nagaland), Diatribe (Nagaland), Eximious (Nagaland), Maestro (Assam), Northwind (Tura, Meghalaya), 24 x7 (Pune, Maharashtra), Alien Gods (Arunachal Pradesh) and Melodrama (Nagaland) - competed in the final rounds on Sunday night which lasted for over five rocking hours.

The Best guitarist also walked away with a Boss GT 10 Guitar Effect, best bassist with a Boss Multi Bass effect processor and best vocalist with a Roland Micro Cube. The individual extra prizes were sponsored by Unitex INC, Crescendo and Music Ground.

Chief Guest at the contest finale, Minister for Planning and Coordination TR Zeliang gave away the prizes to the winners and also the winners of the Half Marathon which was organised by the Department of Youth Resources and Sports. The fest was managed by XL.

The Hornbill Music Festival is an integral event of the Hornbill Festival organised by the Music Task Forc e. Kicked off in 2006, the event is getting bigger and better with each passing year as this year’s edition proved with maximum response. (Eastern Mirror, Nagaland)

A state of the art studio is ready in Gangtok, the Sikkim capital and it will soon begin its service in Gangtok, Mr Nishant Mittal, CEO of the company, said here on Sunday.

Radio Misty which is aired in 94.3 MHz in Siliguri, has been allotted change in frequency for its Sikkim operations, he said.

With the same frequency in the two cities, airwaves from both stations would have overlapped, making it difficult to catch the frequency of the station in Gangtok.

So an application was made for a change in frequency, Mr Mittal said. - PTI

More than 100,000 poultry were culled in Assam during the past 10 days after a bird flu outbreak in the state.

“The Mizoram government has asked traders not to import poultry and poultry products from Assam and asked its officials to maintain a close vigil along the border,” Director of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary C. Sangnghina said.

He said: “There are no reports of avian flu attack in Mizoram, but we cannot remain complacent.” The Tripura government also issued a similar bird flu alert.

“More than 80 Rapid Response Teams (RRT) are ready to act in case of an outbreak of bird flu in Tripura,” said Sisir Paul, deputy director of the state’s animal resource department

To help users learn more words in NE languages, the publisher of the first north-east regional languages-English online dictionary, XOBDO (means ‘sound’ or ‘word’ in Assamese), is on the lookout for more volunteers in these languages to add to the dictionary’s database.

Started as an online Assamese-English dictionary in 2006, XOBDO is the brainchild of Bikram M. Baruah, an engineer of Assam now based in Abu Dhabi.

It is currently run by a team of volunteers.

In 2007, xobdo.net added multiple interfaces to include 16 more languages spoken in the north-east: Khasi, Dimasa, Bodo, Karbi, Nagamese, Garo, Ao, Mizo, Mishing, Tanii (Apatani), Monpa, Meitei-lon, Bishnupriya, Chakma, Kok-Borok and Kuki.

Compared to the 19,388 Assamese words, the database of other NE languages is still very small. Karbi-665, Tai-580, Khasi-369, Dimasa-337, Bodo-326, Mising-186, Bishnupriya-180, Nagamese-138, Garo-116, Apatani -75, Ao -68, Mizo (Lushai) -68, Monpa -18, Meitei-6, and Chakma - 1. No word has been added in Hmar, Kok-Borok and Kuki so far.

“The XOBDO team is now looking for more volunteers in these and other NE languages so that the dictionary can be enriched with more words and achieve its goal of demolishing the language barrier in the region,” said Buljit Buragohain of the publicity team.

“XOBDO attempts to capture the languages as they are used (i.e. spoken, written and understood) today. Therefore, XOBDO does not want to follow any specific dictionary or any glossary/word-list published by any authority or entity. Rather, it considers the present-day meaning to be the standard as it is evidenced in ‘contemporary use’ i.e. appear in renowned newspapers, magazines or the writings of well-known authors and journalists and extensively used in special fields or areas like courts, government offices, religious institutes, traditional functions etc.,” Mr. Buragohain a research scholar at IIT, Guwahati, told The Hindu.