Even as several organisations, political parties and the police appeal to people from the states of the Northeast to stay on in the city and not give in to threats of violence against them, a 51-year-old environment activist, Mahendra Ghagare, has taken the commendable step of offering students and working professionals from the affected community a safe house by opening the doors of his two vacant flats to them.

After the recent attacks in the city on people from the Northeast that are being seen as “retaliation” for ethnic violence in Assam, the community is living in great fear and many have already left for their home states.