With nearly 68 million people displaced in our war-torn world, many believe that refugees are groups of nameless masses. But, in fact, thousands are scholars and academics. Just like our professors. Just like us. In countries where authoritarian regimes are on the rise like India, Turkey, and Russia, academics are challenging the narrative perpetuated by the state–and they are being aggressively targeted in their home countries. These scholars are forced to fee to preserve their safety. In Turkey alone, more than 6,000 scholars have fed the country since the coup in 2016. Authoritarian-dominant countries have increasingly sought to align the academy with state rhetoric. In short, independent research poses a direct challenge to any authoritarian state, and thus states have begun to target intellectuals.
Binalakshmi “Bina” Nepram is a resident scholar and activist here at Conn who came here affair feeing violence in her native Manipur, India, in 2017. She currently works with the Gender, Sexuality and Intersectionality Studies Department and CISLA teaching and supporting students. I had heard Professor Nepram’s name being thrown around in a few circles since I first came to Conn last fall, but it wasn’t until a couple of weeks ago when I heard her speak at an event that I understood the magnitude of her virtually-unknown position at our college.
Professor Nepram’s research addresses armed violence, small arms proliferation and women and peace in Manipur. Manipur is home to South Asia’s longest-running armed conflict where more than 50,000 deaths have been recorded. Having a background in History, International Relations and South Asian Studies, Nepram continued her research at Jawaharlal Nehru University and was instrumental in creating the Control Arms Foundation of India and founding the Manipuri Women Gun Survivor Network. She has represented Indian civil society at the United Nations on multiple occasions. But these accomplishments made her unpopular with the Indian government, and that is why she is here with us at Connecticut College today.
Intrigued by her story, I sought out Professor Nepram for an interview. I stumbled into her office post head-cold while desperately trying to suppress my cough. Before I could even ask a few questions, she abruptly left the room only to return with a warm cup of tea to soothe my throat. The kindness in Professor Nepram’s heart is apparent quite immediately. We launched into our discussion about the lives and importance of scholars in exile–scholars like her. In her home of Manipur, 84 students and nine professors were jailed for protesting against the government. Nepram’s own research regarding violence and advocacy for gun control in Manipur and northeast India brought her dangerous and unwanted attention. “The threats kept coming because we were speaking and writing the truth. But then, little did we realize that the authoritative government who is composed of criminals and drug traffickers did not like what we were researching and what we were sharing” she explains. In 2017 Nepram came to the United States, and after staying on friends’ couches and eating 99 cent pizza in New York, Nepram applied to the Scholar Rescue Fund and was placed at Connecticut College. “I got my dignity back. For eight months I was in the lowest point, the Scholars Rescue Fund saved my life.”
Just last fall, Connecticut College joined a consortium created by Te New School called the New University in Exile (New UIE). Each of the participating institutions provides academic space and resources for endangered and exiled scholars, people whom the New UIE determines have “faced or recently (within the past two years) fed from severe and targeted threats to their lives and/or careers in their home countries or countries of residence.” This arrangement is impactful for exiled scholars and students. As Professor Nepram says, “when a scholar comes to campus, they come bringing the global and local together.” Nepram gives Conn students the opportunity to engage with “the global” on a level that takes us beyond our “Conn” bubble. She serves as a concrete example of what happens when a researcher-turned-activist takes a humanitarian issue to the international level to create tangible policy. We should remember that it is our honor to host and engage with her during these years. But as much as Nepram is a scholar, she also made clear that she is human. And as hard as her path has been, she is not seeking pity; she is seeking community and action and most of all humanity.
I was profoundly moved by Professor Nepram’s powerful story throughout our interview. I encourage all Conn students to engage with her, hear her story, and allow themselves to be moved by her words because exiled scholars all over the world are looking to find a community through knowledge and scholarship; and in Nepram’s words “when you give support to someone else, you strengthen yourself.” So go. Go talk to her in her quaint office in Blaustein, and maybe she will brew you a warm cup of tea over the common connection of being human.
