No dress code imposed: GJMM

November 26 – The president of the Gorkha jan mukti morcha (GJMM) party, Bhimal Gurung, has denied that the party’s central body was imposing a dress code on Bhutanese students studying in the hill district of Darjeeling, India.

“We want the students’ support on humanitarian grounds but, if they feel insecure, they aren’t imposed to wear their traditional dresses,” he told Kuensel in a telephonic interview yesterday morning.

The cultural dress code was initiated by the GJM to strengthen their claim for a separate state for the hill districts in the neighbouring Indian state of West Bengal, by showing that they were culturally different from the Bengalis.

“This is a movement where we can show the world that the hill districts have our own cultural identity, very different from that of West Bengal, and we take it as a sacrifice from those who support our movement,” he said. “But we didn’t impose the dress code.”

Meanwhile Bhutanese students in some of the colleges at Kalimpong and Darjeeling were still being pressurised by the local students’ union to wear their traditional dresses.

“If the party’s central body hasn’t imposed the dress code, then the students’ wing must be harassing the students,” said a civil servant in Phuentsholing.

“We’re concerned about our own security. We asked the studentsunion not to include us in their movement, but we were denied that,” said Tenzin, a final year student in Kalimpong.

Tenzin said that the students were also advised by the Bhutanese government officials to cope with the situation until it gets resolved.

Although the dress code was not strictly enforced in all the colleges, Kuensel has confirmed that the dress code is still being imposed on the students of B B Pradhan management college, Cluny women’s college, Good Shepherd college and government college in Kalimpong.

It could not be confirmed if Bhutanese students studying in the government college and North Point college were being compelled to abide by the dress code.

Tenzin Rabgay, a final year student, said that, because of the prevailing political tensions in the hills districts, about 50 Bhutanese students from various colleges in Kalimpong enrolled in colleges in Kolkata and Delhi this year. “There’s a possibility that some students might change their colleges next year,” he said.

source: kuensel