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Editorial-I

Dhaka’s Brinkmanship

Suhas Chakma

"To our knowledge there are no insurgents in Bangladesh and I have invited them to check for themselves... We will look into their concerns" — stated Bangladesh’s Foreign Minister M Morshed Khan on October 7, 2004 following the killings by the insurgent groups in Assam and Nagaland after October 2, 2004. Although the Assam government has entered into ceasefire agreement with the National Democratic Front of Bodoland, peace remains illusive in North-east India.

Although New Delhi repeatedly expressed concerns about the presence of Indian insurgents in Bangladesh, the role of Bangladesh in North-east India has been beyond the comprehension of the mandarins in New Delhi. After Bangladesh’s independence, New Delhi was gloating over its role. Lately, the tendencies to either overlook or undermine strong anti-Indian sentiment, which shapes the domestic politics of Bangladesh, have been all-pervasive. The belief that trade and Dhaka’s perceived dependence on Indian goods will automatically take care of the brinkmanship played by Dhaka is all but naive. Dhaka’s hard ball game of hobnobbing with the armed groups from India is a part of its scheme to extract more flesh from New Delhi. India’s ONGC Videsh and GAIL invested 30 per cent interest in Offshore Block A-1 and A-3 of Burma’s Rakhine Coast, close to Bangladesh, with GAIL planning to invest $ 129.7 million in exploration and production activities in the next three years. The first well drilled has resulted in gas discovery of 4 to 6 trillion cubic feet in January 2004. Dhaka, aware of the fact that New Delhi has to choose between an onland pipeline through Bangladesh or security risks in North-east India or cost ineffective offshore pipeline for bringing the gas from Myanmar.

Having resolved its Shanti Bahini problem with the help of India, Bangladesh is presently watching and fuelling the fratricidal killings between the two tribal political parties of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the Jana Samhati Samiti and United Peoples Democratic Front. In addition, political leadership in Dhaka has little control over the CHTs, the safe heaven of armed groups from the region. Apart from the CHTs being a "security concern" for Dhaka, it is the last bastion over which the Bangladesh army has full control and do not want to lose to the political masters. India has not only dumped the Chakmas and other tribal refugees after Sheikh Hasina came to power, India’s myopic policies towards the minority Hindus of Bangladesh have been abominable. While the Sangh Parivar has made the issue of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh synonymous with "Muslim migrants," there is a conspiracy of silence on the migration of minority Hindus who directly contribute to insurgency in North-east India, especially in Tripura and Assam.

More Hindus flee from Bangladesh because of the untold atrocities perpetrated on them in order to dispossess them from their lands under the Enemy Property (Custody and Registration) Order-II of 1965, a legacy of the 1965 Indo-Pak war. After independence, the then President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in his Order No. 29 of 1972 changed the nomenclature from Enemy Property Act to "Vested Property Act" "without altering the content of the law." As the Awami League leaders had appropriated most of the Hindu property under the Enemy Property Act, Mujib wanted to protect their interests.

All political party leaders presently grab the lands of the Hindus. The Ain O Salish Kendra, a Bangladeshi NGO, in its report "Power, Safety and the Minorities" stated "in 1999, about 29 cases of forceful occupation of land and property of the Hindu community have been reported in different newspapers... In the Sunamgonj district, out of 21,000 acres of vested property land, 16,000 acres have been illegally occupied; likewise in the Mymensingh district out of 29,722 acres of vested property land, 28,000 acres of land and 300 houses (vested property) have been occupied by one influential person... It matters little if the party is in power or in Opposition. In 1998, 44 per cent was acquired by the Awami League and 32 per cent by the BNP." On August 23, 2004, a local BNP leader, Abdul Jabbar launched a brutal attack against the Hindu families at Adampara village under Rangpur district by looting their belongings, sexually assaulting the women and girls and later on, setting the houses on fire in broad daylight in order to grab their lands. The impact of the Enemy Property Act has been devastating for the minority Hindus. The Association for Land Reform and Development, a Dhaka-based NGO, in its 1997 report "Political Economy of the Vested Properties Act in Rural Bangladesh" stated that a total of 10,48,390 Hindu households have been affected and an estimated 1.05 million acres of land have been grabbed. The estimated total missing Hindu population during 1964-1991 was 5.3 million, i.e., 196,296 Hindus missing every year since 1964. The approximate size of the missing Hindu population was as high as 703 persons per day during 1964-1971, 537 persons per day during 1971-1981, and 439 persons per day during 1981-1991." In the 1990s, following the rise of Hindu fundamentalism in India, the attacks on Hindu minorities in Bangladesh and their influx also increased.

Resolution of the problem of insurgency in the North-east requires a holistic approach and an end to impunity of the security forces must be an integral part of it. India must also not remain a mute witness to the Enemy Property Act, which contributes influx of the minority Hindus and directly contributes to insurgency in the North-east.

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