ROHINGYAS AND THE PROBLEMS FOR INDIA

There is a statement made by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mr Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, on the proposed action of the Government of India in the problem of Rohingya Muslims taking refuge in the country.  These comments were directed at the proposed deportation of the Rohingyas to the place from where they came. There is an explosion in the social media, finding fault with the OHCHR and commenting on the plight of HIndus in many neighbouring countries and the Kashmiri Pandits who had been made refugees in their own country.  Let us look at the problem of these refugees and why this has become a problem for India.

The Budhdhists though claiming to be very peaceful and co-existing with other religionists, the history in other countries had been different.  The ethnic clash between Tamils and Budhdhists in Srilanka is not far back in history for anyone to have forgotten the atrocities committed on the Tamils owing to which a section of the Tamils lead by Prabakaran came together in the name of LTTE and waged war against the Srilankan government. Of course the directions of the LTTE took a turn to the worse by eliminating all the other Tamil leaders who were fighting for equality in the country.  That apart, with the active support from the Srilankan rulers, there had been an ethnic cleansing of Tamil in the island nation leading to a huge inflow of refugees into India and almost all the countries in Europe and North America.  Even after the government's victory in the civil war against LTTE, the assured sharing of power and delegation of powers are still far off for the ethnic minority.  Still there are many refugees in India who do not want to go back to their homeland despite a Tamil Chief Minister for the northern and eastern part of the island nation.  The people who are settled in many countries in Europe and America do not want to go back.

The Pakistan waged a war with their own people in the then East Pakistan because of which the refugee problem became such a big issue in India in 1970.  When the local civil war in East Pakistan spilled over to Indian states and the Pakistan Airforce flew a few sorties over some of the installations as deep as Agra in India, the Indian Armed forces under the leadership of the Field Marshal Sam Maneckshaw took the war to the Pakistanis and made them surrender in East Pakistan and liberated the same as a new country in Dec 1971.  The surrender in the then East Pakistan is the largest in the recent military history of any nation.  The refugee problem did not get solved despite the country got liberated from the Pakistan and a new democratic set up came into being.  Many of the Bangladeshi Muslims who sought refuge in some parts of north east and eastern states in India did not go back and changed the demographic set up of some of the states where they settled down initially.

Myanmar a Budhdhist country despite ruled by a military junta for many years, had been having a problem with the minority Muslims.  The Rohingyas or Arakanese Indians as they are otherwise known are largely Muslims.  There is a conflict between them and the majority Budhdhists in the country.  The military operations in the country left the minorities with no option except flee.  The next door Muslim neighbour has blocked their entry into their country.  The ports are closed and the Navy is entrusted with the task of returning any boat from Myanmar carrying the Rohingyas back to that country. The OHCHR has called for stopping the military action against the minorities and called this action as ethnic cleansing.  The stand of the world body stopped with calling the killings of Muslims the country as ethnic cleansing and no need for further action.

The Rohingyas had been fleeing Myanmar in droves.  They had illegally entered through the porous borders of Myanmar with India in the north east and through Bangladesh. Most of them had settled down at Jammu.  They had traveled in the guise of locals through the states of Assam, Bengal, Bihar UP Punjab and finally reached J&K.  There appeared to be a sinister design of politically influential persons,to settle these illegal refugees in Jammu & Kashmir.  Despite these attempts the demographic design of the Jammu and Ladakh cannot be changed. Let us take a look at what and why there is a problem with the Muslims of Myanmar.

The Muslims in the Arakane province of Myanmar are basically from erstwhile East Bengal settled there by the invading British during the 1800s and do not claim any ethnicity to the region they occupy. There had been clashes between Budhdhists and Muslims in this province in the last ten years leaving many thousands of Muslims fleeing the country to Bangladesh.  In 2012, there were Rohingya-Buddhist clashes, triggered by the rape and murder of a Rakhine Buddhist woman, allegedly by two Rohingya men.  Some of the villages of Muslims went up in flame entirely.  The successive governments have made lots of changes in the laws dealing with citizenship which does not accord equal footing to these Muslims in the country.  The citizenship act of 1982 modified successively de-enfranchised the Rohingya Muslims as they could not get the new scrutiny card as they were deemed not citizens of the country. They could not compete nor take part in the election in 2015.  This infuriated the Rohingya Muslims and the clashes started with the security forces.  The clashes started in the areas close to the border with Bangladesh and spread to the entire province.  The Mynamarese military retaliated and the UNHCR asked a fact finding team to be sent to the country.  The government did not give permission and the stalemate continued with more and more Rohingyas fleeing the country and taking refuge in neghbouring Bangladesh. There are roughly about 300,000 Rohingyas in Bangladesh.  At the instance of Bangladesh, India requested Myanmar to stop the military action against Rohingya Muslims.

The Rohingyas have become a political tool in the hands of many political parties ranged against the ruling BJP who in a chorus demand that the Rohingyas should not be deported.  The security risk of permitting such refugees into the country has not been learnt by the political parties from what is happening around in the globe.  In Europe which took a calculated risk of permitting the Muslims who fled the Iraq Syria in the aftermath of IS attacks, is facing one of the toughest challenges in terms of security and safety for its own citizens.  There had been frequent terror attacks in major cities across Europe after these refugees had been allowed to enter and settled down in different countries.  Added to these examples, there is an input saying that these Rohingya Muslims were being trained and continued to by ISI of Pakistan before they started rebelling against the Myanmarese government.  The clashes between them and Budhdhists were also masterminded to create a demographic issue whereby the Muslims will seek refuge in neighbouring countries.  Given these security concerns and the  possibility of the demographic changes happening, it is essential that these illegal immigrants are deported back to where they came from. But given the present political situation in the country, India is in a tough position to deport the illegal immigrants from Rohingya. Added to this the remarks of the OHCHR on this issue is making the matters worse for India when it is aspiring for a permanent seat in UNSC.