The “Settlers” and “Aborigines” of the Chittagong Hill Tract

Date: 06 March 2010

The subject of minorities is a very touchy one in any country, especially in nat
ion-states where a national heritage or culture or identity (often dictated by t
he majority population) defines the characteristic of the state.
Such modern concepts of states get complicated if there are other minorities tha
t live in the state, each claiming to be a separate “nation” by virtue of its re
ligion, language, culture, etc.
Bangladesh has about 12% religious minorities, including approximately 10% Hindu
s, the remainders being Buddhists, Christians, agnostics, atheists and animists.
Roughly one percent of the population lives in the high hills, e.g., Jayintia,
Garo Hills and Chittagong Hill Tract (CHT) districts.
Historically the Bengal delta was husbanded by people who resorted to wet cultiv
ation while the people in the hills, who were outside tax collection from ruling
authorities, resorted to dry cultivation for their staple food. In the olden da
ys of the Mughal rulers the authority of the state sometimes ended where the hil
ls began.
As we all know it was the marauding attacks from the Maghs (Arakanese Buddhists)
and Portuguese pirates, which were sponsored by the Buddhist Kings of Arakan, t
hat led to Shaista Khan's campaign to re-conquest Chittagong and its hilly distr
icts, ensuring these territories' sovereignty within the Mughal rule. His campai
gn stopped shy of the present-day Arakan that demarcated itself from Bangladesh
by the Naaf River. During the subsequent Nawabi rule of Bengal and British Raj t
he territorial boundary remained the same, i.e., both those districts remained i
ntegral to Bengal and outside Buddhist rules of Arakan, Burma and Tripura.
Unlike the Mughal and Muslim Sultanates of Bengal, the British Raj (esp. during
the Company era) was more interested about collection of revenue and had little
concern about the goodwill of the local people and their legitimate grievances w
hether or not such taxes were burdensome. It was their heavy handedness that led
to the horrible famine of 1769-1773 (corresponding to Bangla Year 1176-1180, an
d more commonly therefore known as “Chiatturer monontor”) killing some 15 millio
n people of Bengal (that included Bihar and Orissa). One in every three person p
erished in that great famine.
During the British Raj a more drastic and concerted effort was taken to reclaim
hilly areas under taxation. In order to increase revenue collection, the Raj cre
ated local tribal chiefs in the Hilly districts, Rajas, who would ensure payment
of such revenues. For the planes, it had by the 19th century already instituted
a similar scheme of collecting revenues from the zamindars (not to be forgotten
in this context the Sunset Law), who essentially became the enforcer of collect
ing such revenues in the form of money or kind (e.g., paddy) from the raiyats -
peasants, and petty merchants. That is, the role of the zamindars was similar to
a revenue collector in modern times.
The CHT districts with their deep forests, much like many other hilly parts of p
re-modern era India, often became refuges to rebels and revenue- and tax-evaders
who would settle (without its true connotation) there to escape from being hunt
ed down by the ruling authority. In 1784 in the nearby Arakan there was a massiv
e genocidal campaign that was steward-headed by the racist Buddhist king of Burm
a -- Bodaw Paya -- who had invaded the independent state. Arakan - the land of p
oets Alaol and Dawlat Kazi - had a significant population of Muslims (commonly k
nown as the Rohingya people) who had lived in the other side of the Naaf River f
or centuries. [As shown elsewhere by this author, the origin of the Rohingya peo
ple of Arakan pre-dates the settlement of the Tibeto-Burman people there.] The g
enocidal campaign by the Buddhist king led to a mass scale forced eviction and e
xodus of hundreds of thousands of people of Arakan to the nearby territories of
British India, esp. to Chittagong and CHT districts of today's Bangladesh. Nearl
y a hundred thousand people, mostly Muslims, were killed by the Burmese extermin
ation campaign. The Mahamuni statue of Buddha itself was stolen away from the Ar
akan. Many Muslims were taken as slaves and forced to live elsewhere, e.g., in p
laces like the Karen State of Burma.
Those Rohingya Muslims who were able to save themselves from Burmese annexation
of Arakan, like many Magh Arakanese, settled mostly in the Chittagong and CHT di
stricts. The Muslim refugees and their descendants that had lived and settled in
those places came to be known by the local name Ruhis, depicting their Rohingya
/Arakan origin. During the Anglo-Burmese War of 1824-26, Arakan and subsequently
the vast territories of Burma came under the British Rule. The exiled Rohingya/
Ruhi Muslims and Maghs of Arakan, and their descendants, were allowed and encour
aged to resettle in those territories south of the Naaf River. While many did re
turn, others remained behind in Chittagong and CHT districts. The British policy
and the subsequent process of return of the Arakanese exiles, esp. the hard-wor
king wet cultivating Rohingya people, facilitated the cultivation of vast territ
ories within Burma, which had hitherto remained barren and uncultivable. This en
riched the coffer of the British Government through collection of revenues and t
axes. Many descendants of the exiled Rohingyas (or Ruhis of Chittagong) would al
so become seasonal laborers in Arakan.
Today, the bulk of the ethnic minorities that live in the Chittagong Hill Tract
districts are the descendants of those fleeing refugees from Arakan who fled the
territory during Bodaw Paya's extermination campaign. They are our Chakma and M
arma people. (There are two other ethnic minority groups living in the CHT - the
Kukis and the Tripuras. The former are also known as the Chins in Burma and Miz
o in India; while the latter lives mostly in the Tripura state of India.)
Their history to the territory cannot be traced with any authenticity before tha
t historical event of 1784. This does not mean that there was no migration of pe
ople over the hills; in fact, there was migration in those days of porous border
s where geography was not often attached with politics, state and administration
. Like any nomadic people, the hilly people had no permanent settlement to the t
erritory - they moved to and fro between porous borders of today's Bangladesh, T
ripura (India) and Burma. Their migration from outside, much like the Ruhis of C
hittagong and CHT, cannot be traced before 1784.
Since the British rule of the territories dating back to 1826, many Bengali Hind
us, Buddhists and Muslims have moved to the CHT for a plethora of reasons, inclu
ding administrative jobs, logging, trade and commerce, a trend that was to conti
nue well unto the Bangladesh period with development of industrial infrastructur
e there.
After the emergence of Pakistan in 1947, the CHT was made part of East Pakistan.
During the War of Liberation, its Raja (Tridib Roy) openly aligned itself with
the Pakistan regime, thus leaving a strong sense of betrayal and mistrust betwee
n the local Bengali or Chittagonian people and the Hilly people. During the war
of liberation and in the post-liberation era, many Bengalis were kidnapped and k
illed by the extremist elements of the Hilly people. [A relative of mine was one
such casualty who was kidnapped and later presumably killed, never to be found
later.] Crimes of this nature continued unabated making the territory unsafe and
insecure. Outside the towns, there was virtually no functioning of the governme
nt. The territory became impassable and unlivable for most Chittagonian and Beng
ali speaking people. They would be kidnapped, and often times killed, even when
ransom money had been paid to the kidnappers.
The so-called Shanti Bahini comprising of armed hilly bandits and extremists dem
anded autonomy and they were aided and armed by anti-Bangladeshi forces from out
side. With the assassination of Bangabandhu Sk. Mujib, as the political scene ch
anged drastically inside Bangladesh, the Shanti Bahini had a new sponsor - India
 - to destabilize the country. This led to tense situation between the governmen
t of Bangladesh and the Hilly people, leading to the deployment of the BDR and A
rmy. The era of instability persisted during the military-supported governments
of Zia and Ershad when hundreds of soldiers and officers died fighting against t
he criminal hilly terrorists.
After the overthrow of the military dictatorship, the situation improved somewha
t, especially with the signing of peace treaty in 1997 under the first Hasina ad
ministration which stipulated total and firm loyalty towards the country’s sover
eignty and integrity for upholding the political, social, cultural, educational
and economic rights of all the people living in the hilly region. Unfortunately
because of its demography and geography, the region continued to see infiltratio
n of arms from outside, which inevitably have gone to forces that are destabiliz
ing the region. Thus, even to this day, criminal hilly gangs who are opposed to
the peace treaty and armed by anti-Bangladeshi governments and NGOs continue to
harass the local police, BDR and military outposts, and kidnap and kill Bengali-
speaking population, including members of the local and foreign NGOs that work o
n various projects aiming to improve the economic and social condition there.
In the last two decades, the CHT has also seen the incursion of narcotics and ha
rmful drugs from Burma and India. Outside drug-traffickers, the territory has al
so become a natural hideout for many refugees and secessionist groups from Burma
that are opposed to the SPDC oligarchy.
As noted elsewhere, some of the Arakan National Congress (ANC) member parties ar
e terrorist organizations (e.g., ALP) and are heavily involved in drug trafficki
ng. It is worth noting that ANC is a racist, chauvinist, ultranationalist Rakhai
ne organization that opposes to Rohingya human rights. In the past they have car
ried armed excursions from the CHT against the hated SPDC regime ruling in Burma
.
In recent years some NGOs have emerged with ulterior motives that are at odds wi
th aspirations of the people and territorial integrity of Bangladesh. No place o
ffers them a better venue than the Hilly Districts where a sizable number of eth
nic minorities live. They want withdrawal of Bangladesh Army that has preserved
the territorial integrity. They want enactment of fascist ghettoization laws tha
t would confine a particular ethnic or religious group into living in enclaves o
r reserves. They want forced removal of Bengali Muslims and Hindus from the hill
y districts. It goes without saying that such demands are unrealistic and are su
re recipes for dismemberment of Bangladesh. Their anti-Bangladesh activities are
also bolstered by some human rights activists with foreign affiliations whose a
genda includes weakening the sovereignty of Bangladesh. Not to be forgotten in t
his context are also some local players that are opposed to the current governme
nt. The latest unrest in the CHT may well fall into their scheme to destabilize
the government.
As Bangladesh government renews its pledge for harmony, territorial integrity an
d stability, it cannot afford to appear weak against forces that threaten its ve
ry existence. Any measure that offers exclusion over inclusion, ghettoization ov
er pluralism, discrimination over equal opportunity is undesirable and must be a
voided.
As hinted earlier, economics has been a key driver shaping the demography within
our planet. And Bangladesh (whose GDP owes much to the foreign remittance of he
r economic labors working overseas) with scarcity of land is no exception to tha
t grand rule. In the post-liberation period, with the sharp growth of job opport
unities within the hilly districts, some Bangladeshis have settled into the CHT.
Many hilly people likewise have found jobs in the planes of Bangladesh, away fr
om their traditional homes in the hills. This is quite natural for a country who
se constitution allows for pursuit of freedom of movement, employment, economic
prosperity and happiness for all. With a high fertility rate among Bengalis and
Ruhis, it is no accident that they are a majority in some Hilly districts today.

The Hilly people are aware of these trends and have immensely benefited from the
overall economic prosperity of the region. Most of them are against the extremi
sts within their community. They also understand that they are the best protecto
rs and preservers of their language and heritage, something that is becoming rat
her difficult for small minorities in a global economy of our time. In that bala
ncing act between preserving cultural heritages and ripping the benefits of econ
omic prosperity they would be better advised to follow the American/Canadian Ami
sh/Mennonite example as opposed to that of the Native Americans living in the In
dian reservations.
In closing, to qualify as an aborigine a member of an indigenous people must exi
st in a land before invasion or colonization by another race. More stringent def
initions require that the aborigines have resided in a place from time immemoria
l; i.e., they are the true sons and daughters of the soil. From this definition,
the Koori, Murri, Noongar, Ngunnawal, Anangu, Yamatji, Nunga and other aborigin
als in Australia, the Maori of New Zealand, the Uyghurs of Xinjiang Autonomous R
egion in China, the Chechens in Chechnya of Russia; the Siberian Tatars, Khanty,
Mansi, Nenets and Selkup people of Siberia in Russia; the Native Indians of the
USA and Canada, Eskimos of Canada and few other races in Central and South Amer
ica are the true aborigines (or more correctly, aboriginals) of our world.
It is not difficult to understand why the British anthropologist T.H. Lewin (183
9-1916) did not consider the tribal people living in CHT as aborigines. The brie
f analysis above also confirms that view. Thus, the Mongoloid-featured hilly peo
ple are as much settlers to the CHT as are the Chittagonians/Ruhis and other Ban
gladeshis living there. Calling these latter people “settlers” while calling the
Mongoloid featured Hilly people as the “adibashis” or aborigines would be false
and insincere! Simply put: all the people living in the CHT are the adhibashis
(residents) there.
Dr. Siddiqui has authored two books and co-edited another one on the Rohingyas o
f Burma. His book – “The Forgotten Rohingya: Their Struggle for Human Rights in
Burma” – is available from Amazon.com.