The indigenous tribespeople who accounted for 97.5 percent of CHT's population in 1947 now constitute only 49.94 per cent, after the resettlement of Bengali Muslims in the region. Representative image: Wikimedia Commons
A proposed review of Chittagong Hill Tract laws has alarmed tribal leaders who fear loss of customary land rights, new Bengali Muslim settlements, and deeper militarisation
Indian attention on post-Hasina Bangladesh has largely focussed on rising atrocities on Bengali Hindus, attacks on their temples, rape and kidnapping of their women. But a similar and far more sinister ethnocide plan seems to be unfolding in the Chittagong Hill Tracts in the country's Southeast bordering on India's Mizoram and Tripura province. The present government of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) headed by Prime Minister Tarique Rahman has formed a national committee, the country's first-ever, on the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT).
The stated aim of the Committee, as evident from the recent gazette notification, is to review all laws and policies adopted so far to govern the three CHT districts - Rangamati, Khagracherri, Bandarban - which were once almost wholly populated by ethnic Chakma and Marma tribespeople largely practising Buddhism and tracing their lineage to the Sakya clan. The smaller tribes practise Hinduism, Christianity, and animism.
The British promulgated the 1900 CHT Regulation to protect the land and customary rights of these tribespeople, who formed a distinct ethnic (and religious) minority in Bengali Muslim-dominated East Bengal that became East Pakistan after 1947 and independent Bangladesh after a bitter, bloody independence war.
The history of tribal revolt in CHT
The Kaptai hydel project, commissioned in the mid-1960s, first robbed these tribespeople of large swathes of fertile land. Later, the denial of tribal autonomy and massive resettlement of landless Bengali Muslim peasants in CHT districts provoked a bloody hill insurgency that lasted two decades until Sheikh Hasina, in her first term as Prime Minister, signed an agreement in 1997 with the rebels of the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti (PCJSS), whose armed wing Shanti Bahini had waged a running guerilla campaign. The agreement promised to establish an autonomous CHT regional council to protect tribal lands, customary rights, and promote inclusive development.
The tribal revolt in CHT was provoked by the establishment of a military junta after the assassination of founding father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman with almost his entire family in 1975. Bangladesh's first military ruler Gen Ziaur Rahman started the large-scale resettlement of Bengali Muslim landless peasants in CHT districts with promise of free land and economic support. It soon developed into a demographic invasion, as the Bangladesh army used the 'Gucchagram' (resettler cluster villages) as a human shield in counter-insurgency operations to thwart the tribal guerillas. These settler villages were planted primarily to block guerilla movement and supply routes and deny the rebels space for expanding their operations.
Also Read: How Bangladesh’s provocative military strategy fuelled unrest in its hill tracts
Zia's successor Gen Ershad, who declared Islam as Bangladesh's state religion and built on Zia's effort to undermine Bangladesh's secular edifice guaranteed by the 1972 Constitution, sought to hit at tribal unity by splitting a single CHT hill district into three to play on tribal division.
Now Gen Zia's son and current prime minister Tarique Rahman has taken the initiative to convene the first-ever national committee on CHT.
Concerns about what the committee may recommend
BNP party insiders say there is a strong undercurrent within both the ruling party and the Opposition Islamist coalition led by pro-Pakistani Jamaat-e-Islami to repeal the British-era CHT 1900 Regulation that gives the tribal region a unique character.
Since the national committee was announced, this writer has extensively interacted with a whole range of CHT tribal leaders, both the families of traditional chiefs and the former insurgents as well as those representing national political parties.
Without exception, they voiced great concern on four fronts:
(a) the committee may strongly recommend and the government may take away the special land-related and customary rights of the tribals in the guise of establishing equal rights for the settlers in all autonomous bodies
(b) the committee may recommend further division of CHT into six districts against the existing three, and the government may use the physical demarcation to ensure some of these districts bear a Bengali Muslim majority
(c) pave the way for more Muslim settlements, specially by proposing to settle large number of Rohingya Muslims who have fled into Bangladesh from Myanmar
(d) provide additional powers to security forces, create more military camps, and crush all democratic protests which may follow the possible repeal or undermining of the 1900 CHT Regulations.
Also Read: India urges Bangladesh to take strong measures to ensure safety of Hindus
CHT is Bangladesh's most militarised zone, with the army usually calling the shots, as the region is viewed by the country's ruling elites through the prism of national security.
As the BNP government and the Islamist Opposition braces for a powerful popular upsurge over ousted PM Sheikh Hasina's planned return, the repeal of 1900 CHT Regulation may help them divert attention by playing on anti-minority sentiments. The CHT issue has been used in the past by Bangladesh's military rulers to mobilise anti-Indian sentiments and that may happen again.
Ethnic balance may be further undermined
In 1947, indigenous tribespeople accounted for 97.5 percent of CHT's population. The Bengali Muslim settlers have overtaken the tribespeople. The total population of the Chittagong Hill Tracts (Rangamati, Khagrachhari, and Bandarban districts) is 1,842,815, consisting of roughly 49.94 per cent indigenous (tribal) residents and 50.06 per cent Bengali residents according to the 2022 Census of Bangladesh.
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Fresh conflict over a possible repeal of the 1900 Chittagong Hill Tracts Regulation and systematic resettlement may further undermine the ethnic balance and make the tribespeople foreigners in what was once their homeland.
(The Federal seeks to present views and opinions from all sides of the spectrum. The information, ideas or opinions in the articles are of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Federal)
