The Rachakonda police on Thursday booked a store manager and two security guards of a Star Market outlet for racial profiling and refusing entry to two students from Manipur. “We used to go to his shop regularly, but yesterday, they stopped us calling us foreigners. Even after we showed our Aadhaar card they didn’t relent. One gentleman asked where we are from but did not help,” says Angam Weapon about the incident on Wednesday at 3.15 p.m where he and his friend were denied entry. A video recording of the incident became viral, drawing attention from IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao and top officials.
On Thursday, Principal Secretary Arvind Kumar took to twitter to allay the fears of citizens. “It’s unfortunate & our apologies! Collector RR district has informed that an FIR is registered against the manager of this outlet and that the accused are in custody. Also request people to come out in support of our brothers & sisters from NE at this point,” said Mr. Kumar.
“We are pursuing engineering here. We never faced this kind of harassment before. We went to buy groceries when this incident happened. My friend became very upset for a long time,” said Mr. Weapon who hails from Senapati district in Manipur.
Police booked case under Sections 153-A (Promotion of disharmony, enmity or feelings of hatred or ill-will between different religious, racial, language or regional groups), 188 (disobedience of order promulgated by a public servant) and 341 (wrongful restraint). “Police will not tolerate such acts. In case of any problem Dial 100 or 9490617234,” said police.
Published - April 09, 2020 06:29 pm IST
