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The Tyranny of the Majority in

Bangladesh: The Case of the Chittagong
Hill Tracts
a
Lailufar Yasmin
a
University of Dhaka
Published online: 28 Feb 2014.

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To cite this article: Lailufar Yasmin (2014) The Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh: The
Case of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, 20:1, 116-132, DOI:
10.1080/13537113.2014.879769

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 Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, 20:116–132, 2014
Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 1353-7113 print / 1557-2986 online
DOI: 10.1080/13537113.2014.879769

The Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh:

The Case of the Chittagong Hill Tracts

LAILUFAR YASMIN
University of Dhaka
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This article analyzes how the construction of a national ideology

in Bangladesh has been achieved through a style of majoritari-
anism based on “positional dominance.” This has resulted in the
construction of a national identity that is based on a particular
form of Bengali identity that subsumes and indeed delegitimizes
other claims to identity within the state, including claims made
by indigenous communities to their own distinctive, place-based
identity. Although a formal peace treaty has been signed, peace
remains elusive due to the cultural hegemony of Bengalis over the
indigenous peoples in the name of the supremacy of the national
state.

INTRODUCTION

Bangladesh is one of the 11 countries that has not signed the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, adopted in 2007, on the
grounds that the term “indigenous peoples” was not appropriately defined in
the proposal.1 This demonstrates ongoing problems for indigenous people
in Bangladesh where the positional power employed by the state vis-à-vis its
minority indigenous peoples determines the fate of the “other.” The ability
to construct an “official” national identity has usually been within the control
of a country’s majority population group, and this majority status is what
underpins the notion of “positional power” in general terms. The majority,
or at least the elites that command its support, also possesses the power
to recognize “indigeneity” and any special rights and privileges that may
attach to it. There are numerous instances in the history of modern state-
making where recognition of indigeneity or “first people” status and any
rights associated with it have been ignored altogether. This has occurred

Address correspondence to Lailufar Yasmin, Department of International Relations, Uni-

versity of Dhaka, Dhaka, Bangladesh. E-mail: lailufar@gmail.com

116
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 117

in many different national settings, both in the west and in other parts of
the world. The history of western colonialism is especially rich in historic
examples of indigenous dispossession and oppression with recent trends
in recognition and reconciliation—as illustrated by the recent “apology” to
Australia’s indigenous people—often being a case of too little too late. But
indigenous dispossession and the attempted erasure of indigenous identity
has scarcely been peculiar to western colonialism. It has become just as
much a feature of the politics of “nation-building” in other parts of the
world. Bangladesh, a country that achieved independence just over 40 years
ago in the only successful case of secession in the Cold War period, has
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been no exception. This is despite the fact that the justification for secession
from the state of Pakistan was grounded very firmly in claims to a Bengali
identity that was different from, and indeed oppressed by, the (East) Pakistani
majority.
Thus, Bengalis fought a war of secession against an East Pakistani elite
(and military junta) to assert their own identity, gaining independence in De-
cember 1971 after nine months of violent battle. But the victorious Bengalis
immediately required the indigenous people of the new state of Bangladesh,
known collectively as Adivasis, to renounce claims to their own identity
and, instead, to embrace an all-encompassing Bengali identity. This demand
plunged Bangladesh first into political instability between the majority Ben-
galis and the indigenous population and, later, into a military skirmish. The
crisis was only partially resolved in 1997 and has continued to simmer since
then. Recently, the current Foreign Minister declared that Bangladesh does
not have any “indigenous” population. This claim has, once again, precip-
itated heated debate on the rights of the adivasis to maintain their own
culture and identity within the state while still being regarded as full citizens
of Bangladesh.
This article examines debates surrounding this issue from a theoretical
and historical perspective. In doing so, it critiques “the tyranny of the major-
ity” in Bangladesh with its exaggerated emphasis on “Bengali” identity—an
emphasis that serves to deny any other claim to identity and that reflects
poorly on Bangladesh’s reputation internationally. More specifically, the ar-
ticle highlights the dilemma that postcolonial countries create for themselves
when they attempt to replicate a flawed conception of “modern” nationhood
that leads them to attempt to force homogeneity on the entire population.
In such exercises, it is often a minority indigenous population that becomes
the main victim of elite-sponsored attempts to create “sameness.” Bangladesh
therefore stands as a classic example of a dilemma where the demand for na-
tionhood has generated a demand for homogeneity that denies recognition
to indigenous people the right to preserve their own place-based culture and
identity and a right that is recognized internationally. Here we should note
that in most postcolonial states, indigenous culture and identity are associ-
ated very closely with place (land) on which their very existence depends.
 118 L. Yasmin

The discussion therefore distinguishes between the positional identity of the

majority, which commands far superior political power, and what is called
here the place-based identity of Bangladesh’s indigenous people who pos-
sess only the force of moral argument and (unenforceable) international law
to back their claims.
The article first reviews certain theoretical debates on nation and eth-
nicity that form the basis of debates on two interrelated concepts relevant to
this argument: indigeneity and place-based identity as opposed to the po-
sitional identity of a state-based nationality that is in turn controlled largely
by elites enjoying the support of a majority population. It then looks at how
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the construction of a positional identity based on the myth of a Golden

Bengal operates to deny the right of indigenous people to express their own
place-based identity. In this context, it will be argued that a conventional but
nonetheless flawed understanding of the creation of a modern state based
on essential sameness is what largely drives Bangladeshi elites to attempt to
impose a homogeneous “Bengali” identity on the indigenous people of the
country.

NATIONS, ETHNICITY, AND INDIGENEITY—WHOSE NATION?

The political transformation of nations as the basis of national self-

determination and political sovereignty raises the question of the basic iden-
tity of “a people,” and which group provides the foundation for the state.
While nationalism as an ideology is a manifestation of the political establish-
ment of a nation, Anthony D. Smith argues that “ethnies” are the atoms of
a nation—identities that are assumed or presumed on the basis of “notable
myths and historical memories, and a link with historic territory.”2 The (as-
sumed) ethnic origin of a nation therefore grounds the past in the present
and projects it into the future to give it a certain continuity that enhances its
legitimacy.
The issue of ethnicity—an identity formed on the basis of assumed
common ancestry and cultural attributes—was often used to explain the
political problems of many developing countries in contrast with those of
the developed world where there was presumed to be a well-defined notion
of unitary “nationhood” established—despite the diversity on which most
European countries have actually been built. For many people of Asia and
Africa, especially those often described as “tribal,” there appears to be an
especially strong allegiance to place or land than to the artificial construct
of a “nation” forged in the transition to independence and requiring the
amalgamation of certain symbols to establish the foundations for a national,
sovereign state.3 It is in relation to the situation of mainly “tribal” people that
terms such as “primordialism” and later the concept of “indigeneity” actually
emerged to explain the place-based attachment of certain groups. What also
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 119

distinguished these people from larger national groups was that they also
tended to lack power and resources.
As emphasized above, the concept of indigeneity is intimately tied to a
place-based identity, where “place” is generally understood to be ancestral
territory. From a colonial perspective, however, such territory was often
deemed to be terra nullius—empty land. This enabled colonizing forces to
treat it as “unclaimed” and to regard themselves as the first to have “really”
arrived there, thus enabling them to make legal claims on the land and
consequently to dismiss the claims of the original inhabitants, even as they
continued to call them “natives”—a term that inextricably associates a person
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with the place where they and their ancestors were born. However, although
indigenous people often lost their political/legal claim to what was their own
land, this by no means diminished their sense of place-based existence that
has therefore remained an essential component of their identity.
The concept of indigeneity actually emerged as a direct consequence
of native people’s struggles to establish an identity vis-à-vis the domination
of the colonizers, starting in North America in the 17th century and later
encompassing the native populations of Australia and New Zealand.4 The
idea of indigeneity is considered to be a reflection of the day-to-day expe-
riences of “first people” in relation to the colonial other in a land that once
belonged to them,5 not merely an anthropological or scholarly invention or
simply an “awakening of old memories.”6 The psychological understand-
ing of such bonds that has developed since the 1960s and 1970s analyzes
place-based identity formation within the realm of cultural geography and
environmental psychology with a special emphasis on the “emotional in-
volvement with places.”7 These studies suggest that the attempt to replace
place-based bonds with a homogenized national identity is never going to
be satisfactory to indigenous populations.

WHOSE IMAGE?

Another important aspect of the discussion of nation, ethnicity, and indigene-

ity that is intrinsically linked with the concept of power is the following: Who
constructs the image of the people? As the history of nationalism shows, the
mobilization of the masses and the promotion of a national culture has al-
ways been an elitist endeavor. As the term “nation” in its French construction
emerged in relation to aristocrats and as the concept of sovereignty initially
associated it with the ruler, the construction of a statist or national culture has
been facilitated by elites in both western and nonwestern contexts. While the
French Revolution sought to bring popular power to the fore, Ernest Gellner
reminds us that the power to create a national image is an elite power, as
“[F]or a given society, it must be one in which they can all breathe and speak
and produce; so it must be the same culture.”8 This aspect has also been
 120 L. Yasmin

highlighted by Benedict Anderson, who has emphasized the role of print

capitalism in spreading unifying nationalist sentiments as well as construct-
ing “national genealogies” that help to forge particular national “imagined
communities.” In such communities, a nation particularly remembers its glo-
ries and forgets certain pasts in order to strengthen its claims to nationhood.9
One past that seems to get forgotten is the past of indigenous history.
The role of elites in the creation of nationalist discourses has been a
subject of much study. Scholars have pointed out how the elitist imagination
can remain untouched in relation to the larger masses, as the formation of
a nation is a continuous process. In this context, Montserrat Guibernau has
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cited Eugene Weber’s work showing how the French masses did not regard
themselves as French until the First World War.10 Kemal Karpat has similarly
argued that the construction of nationhood remained an essentially “self-
secluded elite-based” project in Turkey.11 In the context of India, the creation
of an overarching identity of Bharat Mata (Mother India), based on Hindu
religious ideals, denies the claims of other ethnic and religious populations
to be “proper” Indians.12 Both Muslims and indigenous people are victims of
this othering, where Muslims are regarded as social pariahs and indigenous
people’s rights are curtailed in the name of initiating development projects
in their lands.13
Another interesting dimension of such national constructions is that a
nation can emerge in relation to the other. While nations in their earliest
form emerged with the prime objective of consolidating their identity within
a given geographic boundary, with the spread of communication and the
discovery of newer locations, some nations became more concerned with
constructing their own “first-ness.” An excellent example of this can be found
in the creation of “Englishness,” which was “constructed as a translatable
identity that could be adopted or appropriated anywhere by anyone who
cultivated the right language, looks, and culture.”14 The idea of a “Greater
Britain” emerged in the mid-19th century to refer to “English-speaking ter-
ritories of the globe” that might have “modified the blood” yet retained
connections to England by virtue of the “commonality of institutions and
language.”15
The narrative of nationalism therefore tells us that the imagining of
a people within a specific boundary has been actively promoted by elites
representing the majority. It has always been a “top-down” approach, in both
the west and the non-west. Therefore, Turkey has turned out to be, in S.
N. Eisenstadt’s words, “for the people, despite the people,”16 while the very
first Prime Minister of India, Jawharlal, Nehru privately commented, “I am
the last Englishman to rule India.”17 A state with a dominant nation therefore
possesses a positional existence, equipped to confront the demands of any
place-based identity within the state. As Etienne Balibar argues, the “ubiquity
of borders” has created a situation in which one type of political system has
been institutionalized to curtail the claims of the others that are readily
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 121

submerged.18 While Balibar’s main reference point is Europe, a similar top-

down approach has created a tyranny of the majority in Bangladesh where
the very identity of the indigenous people has been smothered through the
top-down construction of nationalism.

THE CASE OF BANGLADESH

Bangladesh emerged as an independent country on 16 December 1971. The

demand for autonomy by Bengalis residing in East Pakistan against the center
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located in West Pakistan was ostensibly based on two reasons—identity

and justice. The state of Pakistan had been artificially created to provide a
home for the Muslims of India made even more artificial by the fact that the
new country was divided into two sectors—East and West—with India in
between. The people of East Bengal, predominantly Muslim by religion, had
sought to separate from the West Bengal part of India during the partition
of the subcontinent by voting in favor of the Two Nation theory in 1946.
However, this policy was based more on the concept of economic justice
than religious identity.19 However, identity—both religious and ethnic—did
continue to play a central role in determining a sense of belonging for the
people of East Bengal. This was finally achieved with the realization of their
own state, Bangladesh, based on Bengali ethnic identity.
However, the achievement of the East Bengalis in establishing their own
state also transformed the national identity of the indigenous people living
in the south-east region (known as the Chittagong Hill Tracts [CHT]). The
indigenous people of this region, collectively known as the Jumma, have
turned out to be the ultimate victims of the transfer from one form of ma-
joritarian rule to another, starting with development projects initiated under
the state of Pakistan and reaching their lowest point with the imposition of
a dominant Bengali identity that effectively requires that they abandon claim
to a distinctive identity.

JUMMA—WHAT IT MEANS TO BE INDIGENOUS IN BANGLADESH

Indigenous people in Bangladesh constitute about 1.13% of the total popu-

lation.20 The CHT region is home to the majority of the indigenous people
where 13 different ethnic groups are considered to be original inhabitants
of the area.21 These groups have their own unique culture and are mainly
Buddhists, which sets them apart from the majority ethnic Bengalis who are
mainly Muslim. (The ethnic Bengalis are generally known as plain people
and the indigenous people are generally referred to as hill people.) While
this region was originally inhabited by the indigenous people, albeit with
 122 L. Yasmin

some immigrant groups arriving in earlier periods, a purposive settlement

policy initiated by the government of Bangladesh has led to a gradual in-
crease of ethnic Bengalis. The active migration policy implemented by the
Bangladesh government, first in 1972 immediately after independence and
subsequently renewed in the 1980s, had led to an indigenous-Bengali ratio,
measured at 53:47 by 2003. This contrasts with the situation at partition in
1947 when indigenous people constituted 98% of the total population of this
region.22
The CHT region had come under Mughal rule in 1666 and under British
rule from 1760. It had retained its autonomous status under British colonial-
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ism, ruled under a separate CHT Manual of 1900, which was guided by two
principle objectives—the protection of British political and economic inter-
ests and the protection of indigenous people vis-à-vis the Bengalis through
restrictions on Bengali migration. British economic interests in reaching China
via the CHT region and Myanmar originated as early as in 1761.23 However,
analyses of the CHT conflict in the 1980s and later have suggested that the
British had an alternative objective in relation to the protection of the in-
digenous population—the need to maintain a clear segregation between the
Bengalis and the indigenous people.24 In essence, this policy emerged as a
result of a peace treaty between the British and the Chakma King after a
series of wars in the latter half of the 18th century and the final acceptance
of the British right to rule in the CHT region.
During the partition of the subcontinent in 1947, the Jumma people
preferred to be a part of a secular India due mainly to the religious dif-
ference with predominantly Muslim Pakistan.25 While the CHT region was
initially accorded to India, because of political concerns regarding the fate
of the Sikh population in Pakistan, a Sikh-dominated region in Pakistan was
accorded to India in exchange for the CHT in its eastern region.26 An influx
of ethnic Bengalis began in the 1960s under the Pakistani government’s pol-
icy of translocation. The situation reached a climax with the building of the
Kaptai Dam, a hydroelectric project on the river Karnafuli over the period
of 1957–62. The Kaptai Dam, often termed a “death trap” for the indigenous
people, created many environmental refugees in the region.27

ASSIMILATIONIST BENGALI DICTUM

Indigenous identity began to consolidate in the 1960s, culminating with

the formation of the Parbartya Chattagram Jana Shamhati Samiti (PCJSS;
Chittagong Hill Tracts United Peoples’ Party) in the early 1970s following
Bangladesh’s independence.28 This period is significant in delineating the
specific context and reasons leading to the emergence of a collective con-
sciousness. As Schendel has pointed out, “the creation of ‘Jummas’ was an
act of defiance . . . it was a bid for ethnic innovation, to cope with the
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 123

political and economic consequences of loss of power, growing expend-

ability to the state and cultural marginalization.”29 The emergence of Jumma
consciousness lay in the assertion of Bengali identity over indigenous iden-
tity in Bangladesh. This situation prompted the creation of a pan-indigenous
identity under the rubric of which all 13 ethnic groups could embrace a
singular Jumma consciousness as their primary marker of identity.
The first Constitution of Pakistan of 1956 had classified the CHT as
an “Exclusive Area.” Although its status declined to a “Tribal Area” in later
constitutional instruments, the CHT continued to be governed under the
CHT Manual of 1900. However, the Constitution of Bangladesh, adopted on
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4 November 1972, did not accept the existence of any ethnic groups other
than Bengalis residing within the territorial boundaries of Bangladesh. This
Constitution declared in Part II, Fundamental Principles of State Policy, that

The unity and solidarity of Bengalee nation, which, deriving its iden-
tity from its language and culture, attained sovereign and independent
Bangladesh, through a united and determined struggle in the war of
independence, shall be the basis of Bengalee nationalism.30

Before the adoption of the Constitution, representatives of the indige-

nous communities, headed by Manabendra Narayan Larma, had met the new
Prime Minister of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibar Rahman, in February 1972 in a
quest to establish their autonomy within the CHT region. This was rejected by
Sheikh Mujib who suggested that they forget their identity, instructing them
to “Go home and become Bengalis.”31 With the adoption of the Constitution,
legal control by the majority Bengalis was established over the indigenous
people. In a visit to the CHT, Sheikh Mujib reiterated his original position
and asked the indigenous community to join the mainstream of Bengali cul-
ture.32 This move was underpinned by a state initiative to reclaim the land
of the CHT by initiating Bengali migration into the area starting as early as
1972.
Political changes in Bangladesh national politics in 1975, however, saw
Manobendra Larma flee to India. It must be noted here that CHT is wedged
between the two Indian northeastern states of Manipur and Tripura, which
provides India a unique opportunity to play an active role in this matter.
India provided support for the military wing of the PCJSS, called the Shanti
Bahini (SB), which established its headquarters in the state of Tripura.33
The military skirmishes that ensued after 1977 between the government of
Bangladesh and the Shanti Bahini were only resolved officially by the sign-
ing of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord in 1997 between the government of
Bangladesh and the PCJSS. Under the treaty, the Government of Bangladesh
has recognized the reestablishment of the rights of the indigenous people
in the CHT region. One of the major aspects of the treaty was to introduce
a special governance system in the region, which would cover the most
 124 L. Yasmin

contentious issues like resolving land disputes, withdrawal of military camps,

and rehabilitation of returning indigenous refuges. However, its various pro-
visions remain either unimplemented or partially implemented to the present
time.

THE CONTEXT OF THE PEACE PROCESS

The initiative to resolve the insurgency in the CHT region was basically driven
by criticisms that had emerged since the 1980s by international donors, with
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Amnesty International among the most prominent, regarding gross violations

of human rights in the region. Matters relating to the CHT had been trans-
ferred from the Ministry of Home Affairs to the Ministry of Defense from
1977.34 Consequently, the period had seen a growing militarization in the re-
gion as the government felt the need to counter the Shanti Bahini using the
Bangladesh military so that the region came under de facto military rule.35
The role of India in providing support for the PCJSS and Shanti Bahini, while
instrumental in starting armed conflict, also played a part in ending it. In-
dia provided support to Shanti Bahini to initiate its insurgency against the
Bangladesh government after the death of Sheikh Mujib.36 However, with
the democratic return to power of his party, the Awami League, under his
daughter Sheikh Hasina’s leadership, India withdrew its support from the
Shanti Bahini.37 It has also been claimed that the PCJSS was also losing
momentum in galvanizing support for its claim to profess a consolidated
Jumma identity for all the groups residing in the CHT. A few smaller indige-
nous groups had become wary of Chakma domination within the Jumma
community and opted to use their own names instead of being associated
with the overarching Jumma identity.38
The transparency of the peace negotiations has been questioned by
observers, as these were carried out behind closed doors. The negotiation
process was not known to leading members of the ruling Awami League or
members of the opposition at the time. It has also been alleged that a section
of the Armed Forces provided the content and substance of the negotiation
process to the political delegates.39
The government’s commitment to fulfilling the provisions of the CHT
Peace Accord has been challenged, although the government has been in-
sisting that it has already realized most of the provisions of the accord. The
most significant allegation was made in relation to the role of the Bangladesh
Military. It was argued that even though the signing of the treaty in 1997 had
ended the insurgency and the military operations carried on in the CHT,
this did not necessarily lessen the military’s de facto control over the re-
gion.40 Human rights violations carried out by government forces remain a
cause of concern. These have been reported in the national and international
media alike.41 Moreover, periodic clashes between settler Bangladeshis and
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 125

indigenous people continue to take place, with recent widespread attacks

on Buddhists living in the CHT.42 The concentration of military deployment
in CHT, which was supposed to reduce significantly according to the provi-
sions of the Peace Accord, has not decreased. Successive governments have
insisted that a large military presence is still a necessity in CHT to fight “ter-
rorism” and to ensure security in the region despite the official end of the
military skirmish.43

NATIONALISM—A JUST TOOL OF LEGITIMATION

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Internal ethnic conflicts within the framework of a nation-state system, es-

pecially in cases of Third World countries, have often been linked to control
over resources.44 Where a connection exists between conflict and control
over resources, issues of identity and recognition are often relegated to a
secondary position. Yet, it can be argued that the issue of identity is linked
directly with the conflict. The work of Axel Honneth sheds much light on
this. Honneth argues that there is a connection between moral disrespect
and social struggle.45 While Honneth does not reject the idea that interests
can be a basis for struggle, he supplements the debate by insisting that social
conflict can be driven not only by interests but also by a moral reaction to
collective shame.46 Thus, what appears to be a social conflict over resources
or distribution may, at its core, be a struggle for recognition of identity.
This argument leads to two understandings pertaining to nationalism and
indigenous identity in the context of Bangladesh. First, Bengali identity itself
arose as a reaction to the (West) Pakistani attempt to construct and impose
a homogeneous, Islam-based national identity. Second, the consolidation of
indigenous identity in the CHT has, similarly, been a reaction designed to
counter the imposition of an equally homogeneous, overarching Bengali na-
tional identity. Schendel has rightfully pointed out that Sheikh Mujib echoed
the same inflexibility with regard to the creation of a Bengali identity af-
ter independence as the Pakistani elites did in relation to the imposition of
Urdu on East Bengal.47 Consequently, the imposition of Bengali identity has
provoked much discontent among Bangladesh’s indigenous people whose
ethnic identity was to be buried. The consequence was the eventual eruption
of violent conflict.
Bengali identity in East Pakistan was created itself on basis of the myth
of a “Golden Bengal” to assert its own claim to a separate identity rather than
to accept that which the Pakistani elite attempted to impose. This construc-
tion of a Golden Bengal was carried out in East Pakistan through popular
arts and cultural activities.48 Preindependence political rallies asked the ques-
tion: “Sonar Bangla Soshan Keno” (Why has Golden Bengal turned into a
graveyard now)?49 The Muslims-Bengalis of East Bengal attempted to cre-
ate a national “Bengali-Muslim” identity on the basis of a historical claim to
 126 L. Yasmin

Bengal. Although the myth of Golden Bengal was meant to comprise the
whole of Bengal, the political reality meant that East Bengal’s national claim
was asserted on the basis of a truncated Bengal. The result is that the con-
struction of Bengali identity effectively denies claims by any other ethnic
group to form their own identity within the state of Bangladesh.
In contrast with Bengali national identity, a form of Bangladeshi nation-
alism was proposed in the mid-1970s by the Bangladesh Nationalist party
(BNP). This sought to provide a nationalist ideology that would include
everyone residing in the country irrespective of their ethnic origins. In a
constitutional amendment, the word “Bengalee” was replaced by the word
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“Bangladeshi” to provide a new, more general meaning based on the state

rather than an ethnic Bengali identity. Thus, Bangladeshi nationalism was to
provide for a different kind of totality by focusing on citizenship as a marker
of national identity, something that Bengali nationalism could not do, based
as it was on a specific ethnic identity.
Although there was a possibility of bringing the indigenous people
within the fold of this inclusive conception of civic Bangladeshi nationalism,
the insurgency had already begun. In addition, the BNP generally maintained
an intolerant attitude towards particular issues related to the indigenous peo-
ple. The party has maintained that far too many concessions had been made
in the 1997 Peace Accord that compromised the interests of the majority.
Moreover, while in power in 2005, the BNP-led government started to ac-
quire lands in the CHT region, contradicting the provisions of the Accord.
BNP’s unswerving outlook on the matter was very much apparent as the
BNP Chairperson Begum Khaleda Zia termed the PCJSS leader Santu Larma
as “terrorist” in a statement made in the Parliament in 2011.

THE CREATION OF BENGALI FIRST-NESS

A different twist in the struggle over national identity came with new claims
that Bengalis, rather than the groups claiming indigeneity, had actually been
the first settlers in the CHT region.50 This introduced a new strategy in the
denial of the claims of the indigenous people to any particular rights in the
region. The creation of “Bengali first-ness” was based on the writings of colo-
nial administrators who had asserted that the indigenous people of the CHT
region were in fact migrants from the nearby Arakan region.51 More specif-
ically, it is based on the report of a colonial administrator’s first encounter
with a hill tribe that is said to have taken place in 1777.52 However, some
studies indicate that the indigenous people of CHT came from Myanmar from
the 15th century onward, although these studies remain silent on the issue
of who really were the original settlers of the CHT region.53 Nonetheless,
the colonial creation of “tribalism” and the derogatory status awarded to the
indigenous people as “wild tribes, crude, primitive, and aboriginal” therefore
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 127

served to create a sense of Bengali superiority.54 However, the hill tribes also
appear to have had contacts with the plain people, that is, the Bengalis, since
the Mughal period, although this is almost beside the point. Other studies
suggest that the plain people generally had “an invincible objection to enter
the hills. They [were], I believe, principally deterred from settling there by the
insalubrity of the climate, which seems to be deadly to their race, although
innocuous to the hill people.”55
With the Awami League back in power in 2009, the issue of indigenous
identity in Bangladesh has taken a serious backward turn once again. This is
due primarily to the Fifteenth Amendment of the Constitution, adopted on 30
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June 2011. This amendment sought to redefine the Fifth Amendment (1979)
of the Constitution that had replaced “Bengalee” in the original constitution
of 1972. Overriding the Fifth Amendment, the latest amendment reads: “The
people of Bangladesh shall be known as Bengalee as a nation and the
citizens of Bangladesh shall be known as Bangladeshis.”56 The Prime Minister
signaled the official position of her government before the bill was placed
before the National Parliament by asserting that “As citizen [sic] our identity is
Bangladeshi, and as nationality our identity is Bengalee.”57 Thus, it appears
that “Bengalee” has been elevated to a prime ideological position in the
Awami League’s politics. Although, in the same speech, the Prime Minister
added that “[l]ike the Bengalees [sic] all ethnic groups would have their own
identities, such as Santals, Chakmas, Garos, etc.,”58 the legal supremacy of
the Bengalis has once again been established over all other ethnicities within
Bangladesh through the Fifteenth Amendment. As one scholar has pointed
out:

Article 6 [of the Constitution] provides the state machinery with a bru-
tal policy weapon to be employed against ethnic minorities. It nullifies
the ethno-political existence of indigenous non-Bengali peoples who
have been living in this land since time immemorial. It gives a very
dangerous “legal signal” to state bureaucrats, law enforcers, and particu-
larly army officials deployed in the hill districts. “We” don’t care for the
“others.”59

The statement of Foreign Minister Dipu Moni indeed indicated as much

when she asserted that, under the Fifteenth Amendment of the Constitution,
non-Bengali people residing in Bangladesh are neither indigenous nor hill
people. Rather, they are ethnic minorities. Arguing that the term “indige-
nous people” is a misnomer, the Foreign Minister stated, “Unfortunately,
Bangladesh and the ethnic Bengalee nation remain a victim of global mis-
perception about the ancient anthropological roots, colonial history and our
identity as a nation.”60 She went on to suggest that the Bengalis were the
original settlers of Bangladesh according to archeological findings, while the
 128 L. Yasmin

ethnic minorities arrived later, thereby justifying the claim of the “first-ness”
of the Bengalis.
In a reaction to this rather extreme assertion of Bengali nationalism,
Chakma Raja Devasish Roy has pointed out that, as Bangladesh has ratified
Article 107 of the International Labour Oraganization (ILO) Convention, in-
digenous people do not have to reside in a place for millennia to prove their
authentic claim to the land as per that specific provision.61 Moreover, in the
context of the Foreign Minister’s assertion that the elevated status of 1.2% of
the people of a country would compromise the rights of 98% of the popula-
tion, in detriment to the national interest, Roy has argued that the acceptance
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of indigenous identity does not curtail the rights of ethnic Bengalis. In any
case, if the issue of migration is brought to the fore in determining who
the original inhabitants of Bangladesh were—Bengalis or the indigenous
people—the ethnic origins of Bengali-speaking or Urdu-speaking people of
Islamic faith would be categorized as immigrants from present-day India or
Myanmar.
In an interesting development, the Foreign Minister’s insistence on Ben-
gali first-ness, based on the anthropological findings of the Wari Bateshwar
excavations, have been nullified by further research.62 The excavation sur-
rounding the Wari Bateshwar area, which supposedly supports the claim
that the Bengalis were the original inhabitants of the CHT region for over
4,000 years, is not situated within the geographic border of present-day
Bangladesh. This is indeed a blow to the Bengali first-ness claim, although
it does not appear to have impeded the efforts of the political leadership
in pursuing its creation of Bengali supremacy over the indigenous people.
This can be seen in the ongoing Shah Bag movement protests. These started
ostensibly to demand “justice” in relation to the treatment of war criminals
of 1971 but have been co-opted into the overarching political creation of
Bengaliness. The indigenous community, which initially participated in the
movement, has become increasingly alienated as political slogans demand
that Bangladesh be a place for Bengalis only, reflecting similar post-1971
assertions.63 While the indigenous people have sought to revise this so that
it would include both Bengalis and indigenous communities, the Shah Bag
movement appears to be repeating an overarching supremacy of the Bengalis
over all the other identities that reside within the state of Bangladesh.
As the 16th anniversary of the Peace Accord took place in 2013, the
political commitment to enacting the Peace Accord seems to be confined
to pen and paper only. Since the treaty was signed by the Awami League
government, it is often assumed that the onus of realizing the accord lies
with the party. However, it is ironic that the current Prime Minister, Sheikh
Hasina, whose leadership was considered vital in making the breakthrough
and signing the Peace Accord, has visited the region only twice since
the signing ceremony in 1997. It has also been alleged that, although the
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 129

Awami League prioritized the realization of the Peace Accord as one of their
electoral promises during the 2008 election, their commitment has remained
unfulfilled and rhetorical.64

CONCLUSION

It is evident that the politics of identity in Bangladesh continues to emphasize

a singular Bengali identity that owes it ascendance to its majority position
in the country, thus giving it “positional dominance.” By institutionalizing
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it as law, Bangladesh is at the same time effectively denying the right of

any other identities to challenge Bengali claims to constitute the national
identity, thereby claiming monopoly rights for the majority in creating state-
hood. In Balibar’s terms, this is a precise use of nationalism as a “projective”
ideology.65 Similarly, we may recall Hobsbawm’s argument on how a state
creates “national” institutions to reassert claims to statehood and nationality
by encouraging people to reimagine the bondage of nationhood.66 Further-
more, a Gramscian analysis suggests that the activities of the Awami League
indicates a classic example of cultural hegemony under which political civil
society “constructs” the ethos and values of the society according to their own
vested interests.67 The rights of the Bengali majority thus become paramount.
This has effectively delegitimized the place-based identity of Bangladesh’s
indigenous people whose minority status has rendered them powerless in
the face of the positional dominance of Bengali identity. It is also clear that
international norms concerning the status and rights of indigenous minorities
have had little effect, except to encourage the perverse notion that Bengalis,
through the idea of first-ness, are in fact the indigenous people of the coun-
try. This, however, is unlikely to convince anyone within the international
movement for indigenous recognition and rights.

NOTES

1. See Kawser Ahmed, “Defining ‘Indigenous’ in Bangladesh: International Law in Domestic

Context,” International Journal on Minority and Group Rights 17: 47 (2010).
2. Anthony D. Smith, “Nations and History,” in Montserrat Guibernau and John Hutchinson, eds.,
Understanding Nationalism (UK: Polity Press, 2001), 23.
3. John Eade, “Ethnicity and the Politics of Cultural Difference: An Agenda for the 1990s?,” in
Terence Ranger, Yunas Samad, and Ossie Stuart, eds., Culture, Identity and Politics: Ethnic Minorities in
Britain (UK: Ashgate, 1996), 58.
4. John Brown Childs and Guillermo Delgado-P, “On the Idea of the Indigenous,” Current An-
thropology 40(2): 211 (1999).
5. Ibid., 211.
6. Ibid., 211.
7. M. Carmen Hidalgo and Bernardo Hernandez, “Place Attachment: Conceptual and Empirical
Questions,” Journal of Environmental Psychology 21: 274 (2001).
8. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1983), 38.
 130 L. Yasmin

9. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of National-
ism (London, UK: Verso, 2006), 201.
10. Montserrat Guibernau, The Identity of Nations (UK: Polity Press, 2007), 17.
11. Kemal H. Karpat, The Politicization of Islam: Reconstructing Identity, State, Faith, and Com-
munity in the Late Ottoman State (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2001).
12. Manjusha S. Nair, “Defining Indigeneity: Situating Transnational Knowledge,” World Society
Focus Paper Series, January 2006, http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/∼manjusha/ (accessed 13 June 2013).
13. Pankaj Mishra, Temptations of the West: How to be Modern in India, Pakistan, Tibet, and
Beyond, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2006; Sanjib Baruah, India Against Itself: Assam and the Politics of
Nationality (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999).
14. Robert J. C. Young, The Idea of English Ethnicity (UK: Blackwell Publishing, 2008), 2.
15. Ibid., 197.
16. S. N. Eisenstadt, “The Kemalist Revolution in Comparative Perspective,” in Ali Kazancigil and
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Ergun Ozbudun, eds., Ataturk: Founder of a Modern State (London, UK: Hurst & Company, 1997),
140.
17. Fareed Zakaria, The Post-American World (New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, 2008).
18. Etienne Balibar, Politics and the Other Scene, trans. Christine Jones, James Swenson, and Chris
Turner (London, UK: Verso, 2002).
19. Harun-Or-Rashid, The Foreshadowing of Bangladesh: Bengal Muslim League and Muslim Poli-
tics 1906–1947 (Dhaka: The University Press Limited, 2003), 324.
20. BANGLAPEDIA: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh, http://www.banglapedia.org/HT/
P_0226.HTM, (accessed 6 June 2013).
21. Amena Mohsin, “Identity, Politics and Hegemony: The Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh,”
Identity, Culture and Politics 1(1): 82 (2000).
22. Khairul Chowdhury, “Politics of Identity and Resources in Chittagong Hill Tracts,
Bangladesh: Ethnonationalism and/or Indigenous Identity,” Asian Journal of Social Sciences 36: 62
(2008).
23. Capt. T. H. Lewin, Hill Tracts of Chittagong and the Dwellers Therein (Calcutta: Bengal Printing
Company Limited, 1869), 4.
24. The liberals have usually argued that the British policy was indeed used to segregate the
Bengalis and the indigenous people, which could be interpreted as saying that had the British not
created such a policy, the migration and settlement of Bengalis might not have assumed such a political
issue in the present context. This has been one of the dominant views of Bangladeshi scholars writing
on the CHT issue. For example, see Amena Mohsin, The Politics of Nationalism: the Case of the CHT ,
Bangladesh (Dhaka: The University Press Limited, 1997).
25. Mizanur Rahman Shelley, The Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh: The Untold Story
(Bangladesh: Centre for Development Research, 1992), 29.
26. Amena Mohsin, “The Chittagong Hill Tracts/Bangladesh,” Kreddha Autonomy Mapping Project,
http://kreddha.org/mapping/downloads/CHT.pdf (accessed 6 June 2013).
27. Eshani Chakraborty, “Understanding Women’s Mobilization in the Chittagong Hill Tracts
Struggle: The Case of Mahila Samiti,” Conference Paper Presented at 15th Biennial Conference
of the Asian Studies Association of Australia, http://coombs.anu.edu.au/SpecialProj/ASAA/biennial-
conference/2004/Chakraborty-E-ASAA2004.pdf, 6 (accessed 17 June 2013).
28. Nasir Uddin, “Politics of Cultural Difference: Identity and Marginality in the Chittagong Hill
Tracts of Bangladesh,” South Asian Survey 17(2): 290 (2010).
29. Wilhelm van Schendel, “The Invention of the ‘Jummas’: State Formation and Ethnicity in
Southeastern Bangladesh,” Modern Asian Studies 26(1): 126 (1992).
30. The Constitution of Bangladesh, http://bdlaws.minlaw.gov.bd/sections_detail.php?id=367&
sections_id=24557 (accessed 6 June 2013).
31. Subir Bhaumik, Insurgent Crossfire: Northeast India (New Delhi, India: Lancer Publishers,
2008), 86.
32. As cited in Willem Van Schendel, A History of Bangladesh (New Delhi, India: Cambridge
University Press, 2009), 186.
33. Shanti Bahini (Forces of Peace) was formed as early as 1973. See Iftekharul Bashar,
“Bangladesh’s Forgotten Crisis: Land, Ethnicity, and Violence in Chittagong Hill Tracts,” International
Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research, 3(4): (2011), http://www.hpu.edu/CHSS/History/
PapersCommentariesStudies/CTTA-April11.pdf (accessed 6 June 2013).
 Tyranny of the Majority in Bangladesh 131

34. “Militarization in Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh: The Slow demise of the Re-
gion’s Indigenous People,” IWGIA Report, May 2012, http://www.iwgia.org/iwgia_files_publications_
files/0577_Igia_report_14_optimized.pdf, 13 (accessed 6 June 2013).
35. Amena Mohsin, “The Chittagong Hill Tracts/Bangladesh.”
36. Jenneke Arens and Kirti Nishan Chakma, “Bangladesh: Indigenous Struggles in the
Chittagong Hill Tracts,” Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict, http://conflict-
prevention.net/page.php?id=40&formid=73&action=show&surveyid=14 (accessed 13 June 2013).
37. Amena Mohsin, “The Chittagong Hill Tracts/Bangladesh.”
38. Abul Hasnat Monjurul Kabir, “Bangladesh: A Critical Review of the Chittagong Hill Tracts
(CHT) Peace Accord” (Working Paper 2, The Role of Parliaments in Conflict and Post Conflict in Asia),
http://www.academia.edu/2504753/Bangladesh_A_Critical_Review_of_the_Chittagong_Hill_Tract_CHT_
Peace_Accord, 18 (accessed 6 June 2013).
39. Abul Hasnat Monjurul Kabir, “Bangladesh,” 19.
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40. “Militarization in Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh,” 8.

41. “Implementation of CHT Peace Accord: Will They, Won’t They?,” Indigenous Research
Quarterly IV(1–2): (2009), http://www.aitpn.org/IRQ/Vol-IV/issue_1-2/story04.html (accessed 6 June
2013).
42. Inam Ahmed and Julfikar Ali Manik, “Attacks on Buddhist Temples: A Hazy Picture Arises,”
The Daily Star, 3 Oct. 2012, http://archive.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=252212 (ac-
cessed 6 June 2013).
43. Phil Humfhreys, “Peace in Our Time?,” The Dhaka Tribune, 6 Dec. 2013, http://
www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2013/dec/06/peace-our-time (accessed 11 Dec. 2013).
44. This was argued especially in case of ethnic conflicts taking place in Africa and
Southeast Asia. See, for example, Solomon C. Madubuike, “Ethnic Conflicts: Social Identity and
Resource Control, Agitations in the Niger Delta,” IFRA.com, 2009, http://www.ifra-nigeria.org/IMG/
pdf/Solomon_C-_MADUBUIKE_-_Ethnic_Conflicts_Social_Identity_and_Resource_Control_Agitations_in_
the_Niger_Delta.pdf, (accessed 17 June 2013); Cyril Obi, “Nigeria’s Niger Delta: Understanding the
Complex Drivers of Violent Oil-Oriented Conflict,” Africa Development XXXIV(2): (2009); Peter
Vandergeest, “Racialization and Citizenship in Thai Forest Politics,” Society & Natural Resources: An
International Journal 16(1): (2011).
45. Axel Honneth, The Struggle for Recognition: The Moral Grammar of Social Conflicts (Cambridge:
MIT Press, 1995), 162.
46. Ibid., 165.
47. Van Schendel, A History of Bangladesh, 186.
48. B. K. Jahangir, Nationalism, Fundamentalism and Democracy in Bangladesh (Dhaka: Inter-
national Centre for Bengal Studies, 2002), 99.
49. Muhammad Ghulam Kabir, Changing Face of Nationalism: The Case of Bangladesh (Dhaka:
The University Press Limited, 1995), 178.
50. Saila Parveen and I. M. Faisal, “People Versus Power: The Geopolitics of Kaptai Dam in
Bangladesh,” International Journal of Water Resources Development 18(1): 201 (2002).
51. Lewin, Hill Tracts of Chittagong, 28.
52. Ibid., 21.
53. Shelley, The Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, 26.
54. Uddin, “Politics of Cultural Difference,” 288.
55. Lewin, Hill Tracts of Chittagong, 7.
56. “Fifteenth Amendment: All Citizens are Bengalees,” The New Age, 12 June 2011, http://www.
newagebd.com/special.php?spid=5&id=22 (accessed 6 June 2013).
57. “Citizenship Bangladeshi, Nationalism Bengali: PM,” BanglaNews24.com, 28 March 2011,
http://www.banglanews24.com/English/detailsnews.php?nssl=ee49fef85e1bed67b9f530391b9c74d9&nttl
=2012072617585 (accessed 6 June 2013).
58. Ibid.
59. “Fifteenth Amendment.”
60. “‘Indigenous People’ A Misnomer: Moni,” bdnews24.com, 26 July 26, http://dev-bd.bdnews
24.com/details.php?id=201888&cid=2 (accessed 6 June 2013).
61. “Raja Devasish Rejects FM’s Statement,” The Daily Star, 28 July 2011, http://archive.thedailystar
.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=196091 (accessed 6 June 2013).
 132 L. Yasmin

62. Rahnuma Ahmed, “Bengalis are Indigenous to Their Lands: An Archaeologist Contends,” The
New Age, 9 April 2012, http://www.newagebd.com/detail.php?date=2012-04-09&nid=6612 (accessed 10
June 2013).
63. Pahari Promity, “An Adivasi Speaks: What Brings Me to Shahbag, What Pulls Me Back from It,”
in Alal O Dulal, http://alalodulal.org/2013/02/25/shahbag-what-pulls-back/ (accessed 10 June 2013).
64. “6th Years of CHT Peace Accord: Govt Initiative Goes Against the Hill People: Sul-
tana Kamal,” The New Age, 8 Dec. 2013, http://www.newagebd.com/detail.php?date=2013-12-
08&nid=75933#.UqX0afQW02u (accessed 9 Dec. 2013).
65. Balibar, Politics and the Other Scene, 58.
66. Eric Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality (Cambridge,
UK: Cambridge University Press, 1992).
67. Antionio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, ed. and trans. Quintin Hoare and
Geoffrey Nowell Smith (New York, NY: International Publishers, 1971).
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Lailufar Yasmin is Associate Professor in the Department of International Re-

lations, University of Dhaka, Bangladesh, and a doctoral candidate in the De-
partment of Modern History, Politics and International Relations at Macquarie
University, Sydney. She has written extensively on secularism in Bangladesh and
South Asian issues. Her main research areas are religion and politics, ethnic issues,
and South Asian politics.