Bangladesh: Our wall of shame

Dhaka Tribune, February 15, 2015

by Abak Hussain

If you stop people from talking to each other, tensions in the CHT area will only go up, not down

This is a new low for us.

As if the government didn’t have enough of a stranglehold over the indigenous population in the Chittagong Hill Tracts area, now we have a policy that is clearly and plainly – there’s just no other way to put it – racist.

People and organisations – either local or foreign – are no longer allowed to talk to or meet with indigenous people in the hill area unsupervised. Those wishing to do so are required to have military, BGB, or local administration personnel present. Talking to people, apparently, is just that dangerous.

The fact that this kind of directive can even be suggested, let alone pushed through, goes to show what a marginalised and powerless position the indigenous community has been forced into over the years. This should never fly – not with our constitution.

The mere mention of a policy like this should have been laughed off as so embarrassingly retrograde that it couldn’t possibly be up for serious consideration. At least the move has been criticised by anyone with a semblance of a progressive spirit.

Sadly, there does not seem to have been enough outrage in the corridors of political power. The Home Ministry was able to go through with the policy, and forces on the ground are already carrying out the ministry’s orders.

But just think about it for a minute – a person who happens to be of a different ethnicity from you could be your neighbour, best friend, significant other, in-law, or therapist. Now, there are terms and conditions over where and how you can be seen talking to each other.

Regrettably, it is not so easy in Bangladesh to speak against something that is so clearly wrong. The objections can be anticipated in advance: Oh, but the indigenous people engaged in an armed struggle with the Bangalis, it is they who made the whole situation so dangerous. We wanted to give them a chance, but they wouldn’t listen, etc.

The fact is, we have failed badly in properly implementing the CHT peace accord. Time and again, mainstream Bangalis have victimised the indigenous community and choked the life out of them. Hill tracts people have been backed into a corner and denied a voice.

Their rights have been violated at every step. Law enforcement has, at best, turned a blind eye, and at worst, been complicit in the crimes committed against them. Indigenous women are subject to a shockingly high amount of sexual abuse, and almost never get justice. Bangali settlers have gobbled up their land, and have tried to bully the community into complete silence.

And yet, whenever the Pahari community tries to fight back for what is essentially our nation’s failure to treat all its citizens as equals, many Bangalis turn around and play victim, accusing the indigenous people of using terror tactics. What is truly terrifying is that cherry-picking the facts – and many facts about the situation in the CHT are not so clear – to suit the argument can make any side look like the villain. Once that happens, our fundamental human values fly out the window.

Right now, some mumbo jumbo rhetoric of security is being used to justify what is basically an unconstitutional move. We can’t have one set of laws for “us†and one set of laws for them “them.†You can militarise certain areas all you want, but it’s all Bangladesh. Nothing changes that fact that laws and the constitution apply to everyone the same, regardless of what you look like, or where your hometown is.

It’s embarrassing that something so obvious even needs to be said. And yet, here we are. Many in Bangladesh like to rage against the injustice against, say, Palestine committed by a bullish Israel. The Israel-Palestine conflict shows quite clearly that we have no problems in siding with the underdog and hating the bully when it suits us.

But hypocritical as ever, we’ve successfully implemented our very own policy of apartheid. We’ve managed to take away the rights of a minority group, blamed them for their own suffering. We’ve also started an insidious verbal war to paint them as something less than full Bangladeshis.

This ban won’t solve anything. If you stop people from talking to each other, tensions in the CHT area will only go up, not down. There are too many secrets, there is too much mistrust surrounding the whole situation at the CHT, and it needs to be busted open.

The division between the Bangali and the Pahari people has become our own wall of shame. We have to tear it down.