The Rohingya

The Rohingya
An Ethnography of ‘Subhuman’ Life

Nasir Uddin

1
 1
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trademark of
Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries.

Published in India by
Oxford University Press
22 Workspace, 2nd Floor, 1/22 Asaf Ali Road, New Delhi 110002, India

© Oxford University Press 2020

The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

First Edition published in 2020

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in

a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by licence, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics
rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above.

You must not circulate this work in any other form

and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer.

ISBN-13 (print edition): 978-0-19-948935-0

ISBN-10 (print edition): 0-19-948935-1

ISBN-13 (eBook): 978-0-19-909983-2

ISBN-10 (eBook): 0-19-909983-9

Typeset in ITC Giovanni Std 9.5/13

by Tranistics Data Technologies, Kolkata 700 091
Printed in India by Rakmo Press, New Delhi 110 020
To my father Osiur Rahman
and only son Niloy Rahman.
Both left me very untimely
Figures and Tables

Figures
1.1 Rohingya men and women in queue for biometric
registration 14
1.2 Doing fieldwork among the Rohingyas in Pasan Para,
Ukhia, in 2017 15

2.1 Rangoon University Central Students’ Union in 1936,

where the leading representatives were Rohingya
Muslims (Rashid, Razzak) 42
2.2 Newly built Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar 48

3.1 Rohingyas are spreading over every corner of Ukhia

and Teknaf on a daily basis 64

4.1 Inside view of the Rohingya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar 88

4.2 Local marketplace in Ukhia where plastic sheets
are sold on the roadside by the local Bengalis 95

5.1 Reporting place of Rohingyas just after their arrival

in Bangladesh but before their placement in camps 119
5.2 Typical Rohingya camp with roofs made of plastic sheets 126
x Figures and Tables

6.1 In many cases, multiple families live in a single-room

house in the Rohingya refugee camps 140
6.2 Common toilets for many households
in the Rohingya refugee camps 144
6.3 Water supply for Rohingya refugees in camps—one
tube well, many households 147
6.4 Inside a cramped tent in a refugee camp 150
6.5 People/kids standing in line to fill drinking water
supplied by WFP’s water tanks 153
6.6 Many Rohingyas are doing small-scale business in camps 157
6.7 Organizations and countries supporting the massive
Rohingya refugee situation in Ukhia and Tekaf
of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh 159

7.1 A Rohingya woman who was burnt alive but fortunately

escaped death 176

A4.1 Card given to the Rohingyas living in Bangladesh

after their registration in the biometric database 210

A5.1 Major ethnic groups in Myanmar 211

A6.1 Following Myanmar’s fleeing Rohingyas 212

Tables
2.1 List of MPs (period-wise) 43

A7.1 Population Census, 2010 213

A8.1 The main language (families) of the Bamar majority

and the Rohingya, Kachin, and Wa minorities 214

A9.1 Age and gender breakdown by camp/site 215

A10.1 Population figures by period of arrival 217

 Figures and Tables xi

A11.1 Population figures by specific needs 219

A12.1 Resettlement of Myanmar refugees from Bangladesh,

2006–10 221

A13.1 Bilateral trade between Bangladesh and Myanmar

from financial year 2005–6 to 2012–13 222

A14.1 Year-wise repatriation of Rohingya refugees 223

A15.1 Kings of Arakan who had two names (Buddhist

and Muslim) 224
Acknowledgements

T his book has taken four years of my intensive engagement; it

embraces my research on, experiences of, and attachments with the
Rohingyas over two decades. During the three years of its making, it has
received a lot of support, cooperation, thoughts, information, critical
comments, and academic inputs from many people, including friends,
fellows, colleagues, students, co-researchers, and relatives. However,
first and foremost, I would like to acknowledge those Rohingyas
who have been incredibly helpful, appreciably open, and extremely
instrumental in providing their time; sharing their pain, sorrow, and
everyday experience of vulnerability and discrimination in dealing with
their home state (Myanmar), host state (Bangladesh), and various state
and non-state actors. Without the cordial and congenial help of the
Rohingyas living in Ukhia and Teknaf, this book would not have seen
the light of day. The villagers, both Rohingyas and Bengalis, of Vasan
Para (pseudonym) in Teknaf and Pasan Para (pseudonym) in Ukhia
have been whole-heartedly supportive during the last two decades by
providing food, shelter, and all kinds of logistical aid during my stay in
these villages. I am deeply indebted, in particular, to those Rohingya
informants who fled persecution in Myanmar in 2017 and crossed
into Bangladesh for sharing their painful and horrifying experiences
of being eyewitnesses to the campaign launched in Rakhine State
on 25 August 2017. I have interviewed more than 500 traumatized
Rohingyas who were compelled to leave their homes, habitations, and
livelihoods in Rakhine State following the 2017 crackdown.
xiv Acknowledgements

I express my gratitude to the staff, students, fellows, and faculties of

the Refugee Studies Centre (RSC) at the University of Oxford, UK, and
the Department of Anthropology and Sociology at SOAS University
of London, UK, who helped me greatly during the preparation of the
final draft of this book. This book has also hugely benefitted from the
resources of the British Library; the British Museum; and the libraries
of the London School of Economics (LSE), Overseas Development
Institute (ODI), Transnational Justice Research at the University of
Oxford, Queen Mary University of London, Department of History
at SOAS University of London, and the Parliament Archives of the
United Kingdom. I would also like to express my thanks to Professor
Matthew Gibney (director of RSC at the University of Oxford, UK),
Professor Katy Gardner (Department of Anthropology, LSE, UK),
Professor David Lewis (Department of Social Policy, UK), Professor
Michael Charney (Department of History, School of History, Religions
& Philosophies, SOAS University of London, UK), Dr Azeem Ibrahim
(author of The Rohingya: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide [2016]),
Dr Kazi Fahmida Farzana (author of Memories of Burmese Rohingya
Refugees: Contested Identity and Belonging [2017]), Professor Jennifer
Hyndman (director of Center for Refugee Studies at York University,
Canada), Professor Alison Mountz (director of International Migration
Research Centre [IMRC] at Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada),
Professor Rachel Silvey (Asian Institute, University of Toronto, Canada),
Dr Nasreen Chowdhory (Department of Political Science, University
of Delhi, India), Yasmin Khan (Department of Geography, University
of Toronto, Canada), Dr Anuradha Sen Gupta (The Graduate Institute,
Geneva, Switzerland), Sucharita Sengupta (The Graduate Institute of
International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland), and
many more colleagues, friends, well-wishers, and so on. I want to thank
my German friend Julia Zimple who translated Dr Johann Severin
Vater’s book from German to English for me. I express my heartfelt
gratitude to Professor Farhana Begum (Department of Anthropology,
University of Dhaka, Bangladesh), Professor S.M. Monirul Hassan
(Department of Sociology, University of Chittagong, Bangladesh),
Professor Indrajit Kundu (Department of Sociology, University of
Chittagong, Bangladesh), Professor Alak Paul (Department of Geography
and Environmental Studies, University of Chittagong, Bangladesh),
and Professor Kazi Khasrul Alam Quddusi (Department of Public
 Acknowledgements xv

Administration, University of Chittagong, Bangladesh). The Department

of Anthropology at the University of Chittagong deserves special
thanks. I am particularly thankful to my colleagues and fellows there:
Professor Ala Uddin, Dr Khadija Mitu, Dr N.M. Sajjadul Hoque, Faruk
Hossain, S.M. Sadat al Sajib, and Kazim Nur Sohad.
I owe a lot to the support of the Refugee, Relief, and Repatriation
commissioner’s office, Government of Bangladesh, which has been
assigned with the responsibility of monitoring and taking care of the
refugee situation and dealing with the repatriation process—for their
tremendous help in enabling me to reach every corner of the Rohingya
settlements in Ukhia and Teknaf. I am also grateful to those diasporic
Rohingyas whom I met in India, Canada, the United States of America,
Germany, the United Kingdom, Malaysia, and the Netherlands for
sharing their experience of migration, settlement, and travelling all
the way from Myanmar. I acknowledge the support of my research
assistants—Dia Anam, Saima Sifat, and Tasnimul Hoque Shown—who
helped me in recording the narratives of the newly arrived Rohingyas
in 2017. I am indebted to Abul Kalam, a professional photographer, for
providing a wonderful photograph for this book’s cover, which reflects
the idea of subhuman life.
I acknowledge the contribution of my family members in extending
their unconditional and unprecedented help and support during my
fieldwork, writing of the monograph, and dealing with hardships in
the process of making this book. My elder brother, Mohammad Ali
Zinnat (staff reporter at the Daily Star), has always been with me in
my research ventures and academic endeavours. I also acknowledge
the deep sacrifice of my partner, Farzana Ahmed, who took care of my
family responsibilities and social duties to keep me away from time-
consuming tasks. In fact, without her relentless efforts, it would have
been difficult for me to travel in my never-ending academic journey.
I would also like to thank the team at Oxford University Press, which
has been commendably instrumental in making this book a well-
argued and solidly analytical one. Besides, I must thank the anonymous
reviewers whose suggestions and comments were extremely helpful in
developing the content and the theoretical and empirical part of this
book.
Abbreviations

AI Amnesty International
AL Awami League
ALP Arakan Liberation Party
ARIF Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front
ARNO Arakan Rohingya National Organisation
ARSA Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army
BDT Bangladesh Taka
BGB Border Guards Bangladesh
BK Burmese Kyat (Burmese money, internationally known
as MKK)
BM Bangladesh Military
BNP Bangladesh Nationalist Party
BP Bangladesh Police
BRAC Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee
(now Building Recourses across Community)
BROUK Burmese Rohingya Organization UK
CGB Coast Guard of Bangladesh
CNG Compressed Natural Gas
EFEO Ecole Française d’ Extrême-Orient
EU European Union
FDMN Forcibly Displaced Myanmar Nationals
GO Government Organization
GoB Government of Bangladesh
GoM Government of Myanmar
xviii Abbreviations

HRW Human Rights Watch

ILO International Labour Organization
IMA Ittihad-ul Mujahideen of Arakan
IMRC International Migration Research Centre
IOM International Organization for Migration
MSF Médecins Sans Frontières
NGO Non-governmental Organization
NUPA National United Party of Arakan
ODI Overseas Development Institute
OIC Organisation of Islamic Cooperation
ORE Oxford Research Encyclopedias
RLO Rohingya Liberation Organization
RPF Rohingya Patriotic Front
RSC Refugee Studies Centre
RSO Rohingya Solidarity Organisation
RUCSU Rangoon University Central Students’ Union
UN United Nations
UNDP United Nations Development Programme
UNHCR United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
UNICEF United Nations International Children’s Education Fund
USD United States Dollar
VDP Village Defence Party
WFP World Food Programme
WHO World Health Organization
 Introduction
1 The Rohingya, Their Textual (Re)presentation,
and a Contextual Framing

I t was 25 September 2017, just one month after the military crack-
down1 started on the civilian Rohingyas in Rakhine State, triggering
an influx of hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas into Bangladesh.
I was travelling by a compressed natural gas (CNG)2 scooter from
Kutupalong3 to Balukhali4 when I saw hundreds of Rohingyas,
mainly women and children, sitting on both sides of the road.5 At a
certain point during my journey, I got off my scooter and spoke to
some of those women. Most of them were dressed in ragged clothes,
visible even through their burqas.6 At first, they thought that I had
brought some relief aids for them, as they were sitting there hoping
to receive food. Therefore, their interest in me was met with disap-
pointment when they came to know why I stopped to speak to them.
In fact, I had a strong feeling that it was not an appropriate time
for a researcher to conduct fieldwork and ask questions about their
conditions, their past, present, and future. Survival appeared to be a
necessity for them and it was important for me to be empathetic to
their plight, since I see myself as a pro-people scholar and humanistic
ethnographer. However, the momentum of the larger crises and
the terrible situation they were in compelled me to make a feeble
attempt to talk to them, albeit hesitantly. I sat beside them and
started asking them when they came here, how they reached here,
why they left their homes in Rakhine State, and what kind of atroci-
ties they witnessed the crackdown in Rakhine State. Among them,

The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
2 The Rohingya

I met Lailee, a woman holding her one-year-old child with two of

her other children, of seven or eight, beside her. Lailee was taken by
a sense of gloom when she started explaining her recent experiences
and her present conditions. She was seemingly reluctant in the begin-
ning but started pouring her heart out spontaneously. Speaking of her
unbearable pain, she narrated how her husband was brutally killed
right in front of her eyes. Then she was gang-raped in front of her
three children. She was dragged out of the house and thrown in the
front yard. Then her house was burnt down. She saw her world being
stolen and burnt to ashes, leaving her as a witness to her own tragedy.
Weak and devastated, she could barely stand, let alone walk. Her urge
to survive in the face of death and to rescue her children drove her
to leave her home behind and join the countless other Rohingyas
going towards the border to cross into Bangladesh. Three days after
her arrival, she had still not found access to any temporary refugee
camp supposedly set up by the Government of Bangladesh (GoB)
with the help of International Organization for Migration (IOM)7
and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
She had been putting up on the roadside for three days, waiting for
someone to bring food supplies so that she could feed herself and her
children. Lailee, with her three little children, was sitting by the road
with her sordid experience of the recent past, a vulnerable present,
and a completely uncertain future.
Suddenly, Lailee started lamenting, ‘Our lives are not the lives of
human beings. Even animals’ lives are better than us to some extent
considering the way in which the moghs8 and the military have behaved
with us. Rohingya lives are not mainshor jibon (not human life). Het-ton
ekkana hom achhe (We are lesser than human beings).’ Tears were rolling
down her cheeks as she said this. Lailee’s narrative held a strong sense
of grief, a deep degree of pain, and the wretchedness of being ‘human’,
which Franz Fanon has framed as the ‘Wretched of the Earth’.9 Lailee’s
narration reflected the pain and sorrow of many other Rohingyas who
suffered similar experiences in the Rakhine State in the last couple of
decades, starting in 1962 when the state military first took control of
what was formerly known as Burma, now Myanmar.10 Since then, the
history of the Rohingyas has been a story of cruel oppression, exploita-
tion, exclusion, and persecution.11 But recently, particularly in 2017,
the situation took a turn for the worse, which forced hundreds of
 Introduction 3

thousands of Rohingyas like Lailee to flee to Bangladesh. I listened to

several stories similar to Lailee’s, many of which have been stated in
various chapters of this book.
This book primarily aims to understand the painful grievances,
severe suffering, and extreme vulnerabilities of Rohingya lives based
on their personal and collective narratives, notes gathered from eth-
nographic fieldwork of more than two years, and a close observation
of the evolving history of the Rohingyas’ issues for more than two
decades.12 Apart from understanding the people’s narratives, this book
also intends to take part in debates on the body of knowledge about
people who are stateless, non-citizens, asylum seekers, camp people,
forced migrants, and refugees, and those who experience vulnerability,
atrocities, persecution, marginality, discrimination, and brutalities in one
form or another. The established academic genre on stateless people,
non-citizens, refugees, asylum seekers, forced migrants, and camp
people considers these people as ‘taken for granted’. In this way, the
academia quite often presents people’s vulnerable conditions, various
forms of discrimination, and numerous systems of brutality as the ulti-
mate outcomes of statelessness and non-citizenships, which otherwise
legitimize the cruel, exploitative, oppressive, and unkind rules of the
state. This book, looking into the case of the Rohingyas, questions this
academic establishment and political rhetoric arguing whether state-
lessness and non-citizenship are, in fact, causes of extreme vulnerable
conditions of some people across the world or whether the reasons
lie elsewhere. Of course, I admit that one of the main reasons for the
Rohingyas’ vulnerability is their lack of citizenship as they are not
legally recognized by Myanmar13 and hence they do not belong to state
structures. Yet, the levels of atrocity, degrees of persecution, dimensions
of brutality, and the amount of raping and killing of civilian Rohingyas
reveal something more than mere non-citizenship and statelessness,
which I have discussed in detail and analysed in its relevant context in
various chapters of this book. Ethnographic accounts, based on which
the book is written, show that it is the nature of the state; the state’s
very approach of dealing with people of cultural, religious, and ‘racial’
difference; and the exclusionary policy of a majoritarian framework of
nationhood that are responsible for these happenings.
Therefore, the book argues that the way Myanmar deals with the
Rohingyas is not just because they are non-citizens, but it is precisely
4 The Rohingya

these ways that reduce the Rohingyas to a status lesser than that of
human beings or what I propose to call ‘subhuman’. ‘Subhuman’ is
not a new idea in politics and history; it has been commonly used
in genocide literature.14 The notion of the subhuman is well known
in comparative genocide studies, having been used by the Nazis to
describe Jews, Romans, and other people whom they considered lesser
in nature and worthy of extinction.15 Generally, subhuman life means
when a particular group of people live in a much worse situation
than human beings normally do. Besides, subhuman is also used to
indicate non-human categories of animals in anatomy. I intend to use
this word to describe a particular category of people who are born as
human beings but are treated as if they are lesser than human. As the
different chapters of this book will show, my decade-long engagement
with the Rohingyas as a researcher and my year-long fieldwork living
among them have given me the impression that the Rohingyas are such
a category of people in the eyes of the Myanmar state.
The book is primarily ‘an ethnography of Rohingyas’, an ethno-
linguistic and religious minority who have been residing in Myanmar
for centuries. However, at present,16 a large majority of them live in
Bangladesh as refugees,17 forcibly displaced persons,18 and asylum
seekers.19 The book also intends to take part in the theoretical formulation
of the ‘subhuman’ and critically engage with the body of knowledge
regarding the stateless, non-citizens, refugees, and asylum seekers who
have previously been theorized using terms such as ‘bare life’,20 ‘rejected
people’,21 ‘non-citizens’,22 ‘statelessness’,23 and whose ‘citizenship is [the]
right to have rights’,24 and so on.25 This book argues that academic
forums and scholarly communities assume the vulnerability of the
Rohingyas because of their statelessness and express this assumption
through phrases such as ‘the state of stateless people’,26 ‘the face of
stateless person’,27 ‘the miserable lives of non-citizens’,28 and ‘rights of
others’,29 thereby justifying the conditions of these people created by
the state and its agents, practices, institutions, and machinery. One often
sees that the literature on non-citizens and stateless people presents
the vulnerability of stateless people as being taken for granted. Unlike
this academic establishment on the issue of non-citizens and stateless
people, this book is adequately aware that not only are there hundreds
of thousands of people who belong to a particular state along with
holding citizenship in respective nation states and regions such as Egypt,
 Introduction 5

Costa Rica, Ecuador, India, Central America, Europe, Middle East,

Syria, Venezuela, and West Africa, but they also experience everyday
forms of discrimination and persecution on a regular basis and extreme
degrees of cruelty perpetrated by the state. Their situation is not any
less vulnerable than that of the stateless and non-citizens. This legiti-
mizes the production and reproduction of vulnerability as essentially
not connected with non-citizenship or statelessness and also brings to
attention the historical trajectories of state formation, totalitarianism
in state structure, majoritarian attempts of nation-building, and the
nature of the state towards the people from minority or marginalized
communities living in the same state territory. With the ethnographic
details of the extremely vulnerable conditions of the Rohingyas, the
book argues that the nature of the state and its perspectives, policy, and
approach towards the people of cultural, religious, and racial differ-
ences are instrumental in rendering their state of life ‘subhuman’.
The way I propose to conceptualize the ‘subhuman’ is as one who
is born in the human society but has no space in the human commu-
nity. The ‘subhuman’ does not receive the treatment a human deserves
and does not lead the life a human being would. They are born in the
world, but the world does not own them in any state structure. Treated
as o-manush (non-human), they do not exist in the legal framework of
any state. Subhuman is a particular category of people who live in the
borderlands of ‘life’ and ‘death’. Subhuman people are not human in
their due dignity, rights, and voice.30 Citizenship scholars quite often
justify the extreme vulnerability and the stark uncertainty of their lives
as ‘taken for granted’ due to their non-citizenship and statelessness,
following Arendt in her claims that ‘citizenship is the right to have
[other] rights’.31 But I argue that citizenship and non-citizenship suc-
ceed the roles of the state. The Rohingyas, therefore, are in a position
of acute vulnerability and endless uncertainty because of the nature of
Myanmar (militarized and majoritarian) and its approach towards the
people of ethnic (Rohingya versus Burman), religious (Islamic versus
Buddhist), and racial (South Asian origin versus South-east Asian ones)
difference.
Using the example of the case of Rohingyas living at the border of
Bangladesh and Myanmar, I propose five characteristics that qualify
a group of people as ‘subhuman’. I have discussed each characteristic
of subhuman life with detailed first-hand ethnographic narratives in
6 The Rohingya

various chapters of this book. Five basic features that constitute ‘sub-
human’ life include: (1) atrocious living conditions (which makes
the place unliveable and forces people to leave); (2) illegal object in
legal framework (which makes people legal entities instead of human
beings, and hence, people are dealt with inhumanly); (3) homeless at
home as there is nowhere to go (which renders people shelter-less as
the home state denies them their right to live in their land of birth and
as people of the soil); (4) a condition in which the subject is always vul-
nerable to being killed, raped, and burnt (which allows the state, state
agents, and state practice to kill, rape, and burn these people and their
properties with deliberate coercion); (5) a life deemed fit for extinction
(which denotes a particular form of life which lacks the basic amenities
for survival).
Subhuman life could be an individual life or lives of a group of
people, but the individual or the group must experience five condition-
alities enshrined in its theoretical formulation. This book could also
be understood through the lens of ‘the human rights of non-citizens’32
who encounter atrocities and oppressions committed by the state and
its practices due to their status as non-citizens. Therefore, the book cuts
across the boundaries of scholarship that include the anthropology
of human rights,33 anthropology of the state,34 and anthropology of
citizenship.35 The anthropology of human rights focuses on human
rights from multiple perspectives, its implementation and protec-
tion, its institutional dimensions, and the dilemmas associated with
human rights in cross-cultural perspective in local–global contexts.
Anthropology of the state examines the institutions, spaces, ideas,
practices, and representations that constitute the ‘state’ in the local-
societal dynamics. Therefore, both bodies of theoretical domain befit
the case of the Rohingyas.
On citizenship alone, anthropology has produced a rich amount
of literature,36 which discusses the liberal connotations of universal
rights, leaving out many local-social-cultural practices that inform non-
citizens’ daily dealings with the political realities. Therefore, there is a
need for ‘the anthropology of non-citizens’, which is still in the mak-
ing. The broader divide in theories of citizenship is between (1) the
liberal definitions in terms of political-economic rights and duties of an
individual37 and (2) communitarian theories that emphasize the partici-
patory and relational aspects of citizenship as a matter of community
 Introduction 7

politics.38 Some have considered citizenship as a legal status39 while

others see it as ‘a process’.40 However, non-citizenship is still relatively a
non-issue in academia and policy formulation as academics are heavily
involved in the issues of citizenship and human rights. Therefore, ‘it
is difficult to examine the status of non-citizens, obligations towards
them, and … their roles in political systems.’41 Consequently, there is a
critical gap between theorizing non-citizens and the lived experiences
of people. This book addresses this gap in the case of the Rohingyas.
Having considered the conceptual framework of relations between the
state of non-citizens, their atrocious conditions, and the dreadful roles
of the state to make the lives of the Rohingyas ‘unliveable’, we are com-
pelled to consider such a life as ‘subhuman’.
Though considerable literature42 has been published on citizenship,
there is still a dearth of ethnographic study of non-citizens in anthro-
pology and in the social sciences. It is equally applicable to the
Rohingyas as serious academic attention has not yet been paid to them.
Despite the vast amount of work on the issues of the stateless, asylum
seekers, migrants, and refugees across the world, very few critical aca-
demic works have been written on the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh
and elsewhere as of today. Renowned historian Abdul Karim43 wrote a
book about the history of the Rohingyas, particularly focusing on who
the Rohingyas are and how they, for the first time, appeared in the
demography of Arakan in Burma. Karim attempted to prove that the
Rohingyas are the descendants of the Arab-origin traders and explorers
who came to Arakan in the eighth century. However, he heavily relied
on the works of the noted poets of the medieval period, namely Alaol,44
which has raised the question of whether poetry could be the basis of
historical facts and an authentic source of history. Several subsequent
scholarships have seemingly failed to establish a solid and authentic
historical foundation of the Rohingyas in Arakan, since majority of
them have used Karim as their main source of information. Abdur
Razzak and Mahfuzul Haque45 have co-written a book that discusses
the ethno-historical and political background of the Rohingyas and the
history of Rohingya migrations in Bangladesh. Their book sheds light
on the political history of Arakan in connection with the Rohingya
influx in Bangladesh. It does not touch the current state of the Rohingyas
in which state agencies are engaged in serious human rights violations
and dreadful persecution. It seems more like a political statement than
8 The Rohingya

a critical analysis of the existing crisis that the Rohingyas are experienc-
ing. Imtiaz Ahmed46 edited a book on the plight of Rohingya refugees
in Bangladesh as an outcome of his experience as a consultant. The
book contains eight chapters, including the ‘Introduction’ and
‘Conclusion’, that focus on the history of emergence of the refugee cri-
sis, transformation of the state of Myanmar from colonial through
post-colonial to the process of democratization, genealogy of influx
that started from 1978, the current refugee situation in Bangladesh, and
the potential policy recommendations regarding how to resolve the
Rohingya refugee crisis. It recommends how and why the state, civil
society, and international community should come forward to resolve
the Rohingya refugee issue. However, it does not pay attention to the
issue of how they become subject to discrimination and injustice com-
mitted by state institutions and state machineries at the local level in
Bangladesh and Myanmar. My earlier work, an edited volume on the
Rohingyas,47 puts together various perspectives—legal, political, eco-
logical, socio-cultural, and transnational—to form a comprehensive
framework for understanding the plight of Rohingya refugees in
Bangladesh. It talks about the brief ethnic history of the Rohingyas,
their shift of status from residents to stateless people in Myanmar and
from stateless people to refugee-hood in Bangladesh, their roles in
environmental degradation, their crisis of social integration, how the
Rohingya crisis impacts interstate relations between Bangladesh and
Myanmar, and so on. It also lacks rigour in explaining how the state
regulates the everyday life of the Rohingyas despite their statelessness.
Apart from four books specifically focusing on the Rohingyas, there are
four more books48 that are widely referred to when studying the
Arakan-Bengal relations and the history of Muslims in Arakan, with the
Rohingyas placed at the centre of the discussion. Mohammad Ali
Chowdhury has written a detailed historical genealogy of Bengal-
Arakan relations in his book,49 where he has wonderfully depicted the
political trajectory of various dynasties in both Bengal and Arakan and
how the relationship between both the neighbouring states has been
changed on the basis of the bilateral trade, and strategic and geopoliti-
cal interests. As part of the Bengal–Arakan relations, Chowdhury has
time and again brought up the issues of Rohingya settlement and their
transborder mobility. The origin of Rohingya ethnicity and their strug-
gle for existence in the state formation and nation-building in Myanmar
 Introduction 9

is completely absent. Mohibullah Siddiquee edited a book50 in Bengali

where he housed a couple of very good chapters that focused on the
first arrivals of Muslims in Arakan, their exploration, their settlements,
and their roles in the state management of Arakan. Some of the
chapters in Siddiquee’s book are very informative and analytically
sound, they focus on the historical chronology of Muslim settlement in
Arakan that started from the seventh century. The book, in almost all
chapters, claims that the emergence of Muslims is the beginning of the
appearance of the Rohingyas in the demographic composition of
Arakan. It lacks logical ground because the Muslims who first arrived in
Arakan were not the Rohingyas by ethnicity. Therefore, the arrival of
Muslims does not essentially confirm the emergence of the Rohingyas
in Arakan. Besides, it does not contain anything regarding the current
Rohingya situation in Bangladesh and Myanmar. Mahfuzur Rahman
Akhanda has written a book51 on the history of Muslims in Arakan,
which has heavily emphasized the Muslim arrival, their settlement,
their struggle for survival, their role in the expansion of Islam, and their
contribution to the spreading of Islam in this region, particularly in
Arakan. It discusses little about the history of the Rohingyas
separately; rather it largely pays attention to the history of Muslims in
Arakan. Besides, it does not contain anything about the struggle of the
Rohingyas following the decolonization process in Burma and later
Myanmar. Akhanda has recently written another book52 in which a
large chunk of information has been reproduced from the discussion in
his earlier book, along with some updated information. He has
attempted to touch upon the recurrent Rohingya refugee situation in
Bangladesh and how the crisis has been represented by the local media.
However, the book solely depends on secondary resources and lacks
analytical depth. Habib Ullah’s book title53 seems interesting but it
hardly has any historical record, authentic source, or academically
acceptable data which can help us understand the history of the
Rohingyas. Besides, the book is not systematically and methodologically
organized enough to be treated as a serious academic piece, and
thereby connot not be authenticated or used as a source in any
quality academic writing. Apart from that, it has completely missed
the dynamics of the Rohingya crisis that started from 1962. So, many
books have been written on the Rohingyas, but rarely does anyone
address the authentic history of the Rohingyas as an ethnic group, their
10 The Rohingya

constant struggle for survival, and the recent horrifying experience of

brutality perpetrated by the Myanmar state. I have recently written a
book54 in Bengali based on the lives of the Rohingyas. In its introduc-
tory chapter, this book has attempted to explore the historical trajecto-
ries of Arakan and Burma to trace the ethno-history of the Rohingyas.
Besides, the book talks about the recent developments of the Rohingya
crisis, the role of Bangladesh state in handling this crisis, the deliberate
policies of Myanmar to drive the Rohingyas out of Rakhine State, their
atrocious living conditions in Rakhine State, the roles of international
communities, the transforming relations between the local community
and the Rohingyas in south-eastern Bangladesh, the roles of non-
governmental organizations (NGOs), and the possible solutions to the
Rohingyas problem. My Bengali book on the Rohingyas is also based
on my decade-long experience of dealing with the Rohingya issue and
my recent field visits to Ukhia and Teknaf. Therefore, it could be consid-
ered as a comprehensive Bengali book for the local audience based on
ethnographic field experience.
Apart from all the aforementioned books, a good number of
scholarly articles have been published that address various aspects of
Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh. Paying attention to the gender issue,
Gawher Nayeem Wahra55 discussed the context of how women are
more vulnerable among Rohingya refugees. Eileen Pittaway56 wrote
a chapter on the role of the international community and their fail-
ure to implement the successful repatriation of Rohingya refugees in
Bangladesh. In her chapter, she has written about the potential of third-
country resettlement and local integration as a posssible solution to the
Rohingya problem, but she suggested that voluntary repatriation is the
best and lasting solution, something that the international community
has failed to do. However, this write-up also lacks the current dynamics
of the Rohingya problem. Utpala Rahman57 took the Rohingya refugee
situation as a security issue to address how domestic security is threat-
ened due to Rohingya involvement in militant activities; Chris Lewa58
wrote about the miserable living conditions and poor healthcare
situation of Rohingya refugees living in Bangladesh; Kristy Crabtree59
shed light on their economic challenges and coping strategies; Victoria
Palmer60 focused on the role and politics of Muslim aid agencies in
operating relief programmes for the Rohingyas; A.K.M. Ahsan Ullah61
wrote about the social integration and political marginalization that
 Introduction 11

historically shaped the current vulnerable conditions of Rohingya life;

and Naushin Parnini62 illuminated how the Rohingya refugee issue
reshapes Bangladesh–Myanmar bilateral relations. Susan Hutchinson63
wrote about the gender dimension of the Rohingya crisis, focusing par-
ticularly on pregnant women in refugee camps who crossed the border
in 2016 and also more recently. However, she missed out on the broader
spectrum of the Rohingya experience of brutality, atrocity, and persecu-
tion perpetrated by the state agents. Jobair Alam64 has written about the
minority status of the Rohingyas in Myanmar, discussing four factors:
(1) development of Burmese nationalism; (2) politicization of identity
for Burmese majority; (3) taking away the citizenship of the Rohingyas;
and (4) ethnic divisions in Myanmar society. These factors have played
significant roles in (re)constructing their identity as a minority. The
article also misses out on the severe sufferings of the Rohingyas due to
state-sponsored violence and systematic atrocities. The list of articles
could be longer, but majority of them are more or less in the genre of
political analysis based on secondary sources and media reports.
Therefore, in my opinion, most of these articles seriously lack the
empirical data, personal narratives of Rohingyas’ lived experiences,
and analytical strength to unfold the extreme degree of vulnerability
that the Rohingyas are currently undergoing and which has made their
existence lesser than that of humans. Besides, many reports published
by many national and international organizations and human rights
bodies65 are available, but most of them lack academic authenticity
since they follow a set of prescribed ideas and agendas.
In his recent book, Azeem Ibrahim66 attempted to establish the
premise that what Myanmar is doing today with the Rohingyas in
Rakhine State is a ‘fair genocide’, in what he calls ‘hidden genocide’.
Ibrahim wrote about the history of the Rohingyas from the unknown
past to 1848 when Burma decolonized, moved from independence to
democracy (1948–2010), returned to democracy (2008–15), miseries of
the Rohingyas (2008–15), the current situation in Rakhine State, why
we should call the state’s atrocities as genocide under international law,
and finally what would be a potential solution or what we could do.
It largely leaves out the Rohingyas’ voices and first-hand narratives, as
the whole book is based on secondary sources, historical data, news-
paper reports, and personal analysis of the facts. The book also does
not cover what the situation in Bangladesh is, as far as the Rohingyas
12 The Rohingya

are concerned. Kazi Fahmida Farzana has recently published a book67

where she focuses on the Rohingya identities and its contestation with
Myanmar state’s narratives about the Rohingyas and Rohingyas’ prob-
lem. She has also discussed reconstruction of the social memories of
the Rohingyas and everyday life at refugee camps, but she has taken art
and music as the symbol of identity and everyday resistance. She also
misses out on the ground realities of how the Rohingyas face discrimi-
nation everyday due to their statelessness. She does not pay attention
to the atrocious conditions in Rakhine State, which force hundreds of
thousands of Rohingyas to flee to Bangladesh. The book also lacks an
empirical foundation of discussion and analysis, and thereby, Rohingyas
are not heard with due priority and privilege. Francis Wade68 published
a book that discussed the degree of Buddhist violence and how such
widespread violence made the Muslims ‘Others’ in the Myanmar state
structure. His book is basically a journalistic analysis of the crisis, but
he has paid adequate attention to the history of colonialism and the
transition of postcolonial period along with its ethnic and religious
divide between national majority and ethnic minorities including the
Rohingyas. It has little discussion about the Rohingya crisis. Besides,
one of the big concerns is that the entire crisis has been represented
as a matter of religious intolerance, instead of Myanmar state’s nature
and policy towards the ethnic, religious, and racial minority within its
borders. Sabyasachi Basu Ray and Ranabir Samaddar69 have recently
edited a volume on the Rohingyas in South Asia, which contains seven
chapters focusing on: their statelessness, becoming ‘boat people’, their
vulnerable state in India, particularly in Hyderabad and West Bengal,
and their different forms of struggle in India and Bangladesh. It looks
at the broader picture of historical and political dimensions of the
Rohingya crisis, without having the narratives of the brutal experi-
ences they lived through in 2016 and 2017. Anthony Ware and Costas
Laoutides’s70 book, putting the word Rohingya within inverted commas
confirms that the authors are not even ready to call them the Rohingyas.
The book is basically about the Rohingya crisis from Myanmar’s per-
spective and the authors’ position becomes conspicuous right from the
beginning of the book as they have taken a clear stand in supporting
military roles in Myanmar. The book has seven chapters and all of them
seem like ‘leaflets’ of the Myanmar state without considering the ground
reality and horrible experiences that the Rohingyas lived through due
 Introduction 13

to state-sponsored persecution in what is widely known as a ‘textbook

example of ethnic cleaning’.71
Clearly, there is a serious dearth of good ethnographic and com-
prehensive studies to understand the plight of Rohingya refugees in
Myanmar, where silent atrocities, deep injustice, and everyday discrimi-
nation are committed by the state and its agents. It is my attempt to fill
this academic vacuum and provide policymakers with a comprehensive
picture of the continuing crisis of the Rohingya refugees, which could
be instrumental in resolving their problem through cooperation and
rehabilitation rather than conflict. This book could also present before
the international community the ground reality of what is happening
in the lives of Rohingyas, with a considerable number of personal nar-
ratives and collective memories recorded from the lived experiences of
the Rohingyas in both Bangladesh and Myanmar. More importantly,
the book aims to bring the human rights of non-citizens and stateless
people before the international community, rights bodies, academia,
political sphere, and public domain with particular reference to the
case of the Rohingyas in Bangladesh.
This book is an outcome of my years of engagement with the
Rohingya community spanning from 1997 to 2019. In my professional
capacity, I began working on the Rohingya refugees from 2001 onwards
when I joined the University of Chittagong as a faculty member of
anthropology. Having lived in close proximity with the Rohingyas
since my boyhood—as I was born and brought up in Cox’s Bazar in
Bangladesh, which has been inhabited by Rohingya refugees since
1978—I got the opportunity to observe their presence, their everyday
struggle for survival, and their interaction with the local host society.
This is what explains my academic investment and the long analytical
perspective, having been witness to the transformation of Rohingya
problems in both Bangladesh and Myanmar over all these years.
My training in anthropology at the University of Dhaka shaped my
outlook of being open to a bottom-up approach, which gave me dif-
ferent insights, unlike the popular narratives regarding the Rohingyas
in Bangladesh. Besides, my studies in Japan, the United Kingdom,
Germany, the Netherlands, and India, as well as my research engage-
ment with colleagues from various universities in the United States of
America, Canada, Japan, India, Germany, and the United Kingdom
on the complex relations of the state, marginality, and the people of
14 The Rohingya

Figure 1.1 Rohingya men and women in queue for biometric registration
Source: Author’s personal collection.

cultural difference gave me a deep analytical scholarship and a solid

theoretical foundation to understand the evolving relations between
the state and the Rohingyas. This is instrumental to articulate a theo-
retical platform like ‘subhuman’ life and to understand the extreme
vulnerability of the people.
 Introduction 15

Figure 1.2 Fieldwork among the Rohingyas in Pasan Para, Ukhia, in 2017
Source: Author’s personal collection.

I have undertaken ethnographic research on both Rohingya refugees

and unregistered Rohingyas who live in Bangladesh. The data discussed
is comprehensive, descriptive, and qualitative in nature. I under-
took classical ethnographic fieldwork in the communities of Teknaf
and Ukhia—two sub-districts of Cox’s Bazar, a borderland between
Bangladesh and Myanmar—for more than two years in different phases
spread across a period of over two decades.
Out of the many villages cohabited by unregistered Rohingyas
and local Bengalis in Teknaf and Ukhia, I selected two—Vasan Para72
(pseudonym) in Teknaf and Pasan Para73 (pseudonym) in Ukhia.74
These two villages often appeared in newspaper reports for violent
clashes between the Bengalis and the Rohingyas.75 I also visited the
Kutupalong and Nayapara makeshift refugee camps—’Taal’ located in
Ukhia and ‘Leda’ located in Teknaf—many times between 1997 and
2018. Apart from these, I recorded hundreds of case studies, life histo-
ries, genealogies, and personal narratives during this long period of my
engagement with the Rohingyas as a researcher. I interviewed hundreds
16 The Rohingya

of Rohingyas in 1992, 2012, 2015, 2016, and 2017, following the new
influx. Very recently, I interviewed more than five hundred newly
arrived Rohingyas and recorded their personal narratives and collective
memories regarding their settlement in Rakhine State, why they fled to
Bangladesh, how they crossed the border and got shelter in Bangladesh,
and their thoughts on their collective future. Besides, I interviewed
many diaspora Rohingya communities who live in different countries
across the world, particularly those from Waterloo-Kitchenware area in
Canada,76 Heidelberg in Germany,77 Bradford in England, and Penang
in Malaysia.78
This book ought not to be seen as just an outcome of fieldwork in a
certain period of time, based on some selected case studies, and on the
experience of a couple of sojourns following typical methodological cat-
egories of social sciences, particularly orthodox ‘ethnographic principle
in practice’.79 I would rather present this work as an in-depth account
of my decades-long intimacy and engagement with the Rohingya issue.
This book is structurally organized into eight chapters, starting with
Chapter 1 that provides a comprehensive introduction and ending with
a concluding note in Chapter 8. Each chapter is independent as well as a
part of the whole that constitutes a moving picture of the Rohingya life.
Chapter 2 places the Rohingyas in their historical, political, and cul-
tural context—who they are, where did they come from, how did they
appear in the demographic composition of Burma, and the human
geography of Arakan or what is now called the Rakhine State. It brings
in the historical trajectory of Muslim settlements in this region dating
back to the eighth century when Arab traders first anchored in northern
Arakan and settled down there. Among other things, it also critically
engages with the debate on whether the emergence of Muslims in
Arakan laid down the foundation of Rohingya ethnicity or whether
becoming Rohingya was tied to their distinctive social practices, cul-
tural heritage, and a continuity of particular ethnicity. Towards this
objective, the chapter explores the historical chronology of different
political upheavals that have gradually pushed them to the margin of
the state. It lays the ground for other studies to begin their research on
the Rohingyas with a critical reconsideration of the ethnic, regional,
and political history of Arakan/Rakhine State across time.
Chapter 3 discusses the crises of social integration of Rohingya refu-
gees in the host societies of south-eastern Bangladesh. It argues that
 Introduction 17

hosting the refugee is always problematic and troublesome from the

perspective of the host society and the host’s perception is hurtful to
the refugees. State-level perception and local-level realities are strik-
ingly different when it comes to hosting refugees. What the state thinks
of as right-doing from the top might appear as wrong-doing from the
bottom of society. Local society always encounters the problems in the
periphery more directly and explicitly than the state in the centre. This
chapter merely focuses on the dynamics of interaction between the
host society and the migrated refugees at the grass-root level through
the metaphor of ‘hosting’ and ‘hurting’. Though hosting and hurting
are perceived from subjective interpretations, the chapter attempts to
unveil the objective reality in the context of the dilemma regarding
integration between refugees and the host society in the case of the
Rohingyas in Bangladesh.
Chapter 4 examines the plight of stateless people who are born in
one state but live in another state, neither of which recognizes them
as full citizens. This practice is in sharp contrast with the individual
right to citizenship. In an era characterized by people’s increasing
mobility, while moving across borders is becoming a universal right,
albeit slowly, legal implications of the individual right to citizenship
require that globally, citizenship should not be limited within territo-
rial boundaries and nation states. The individual right to citizenship
instead could even be de-territorialized and seen in a post-national
framework, where border crossers could have the right to citizenship.
This may open roads to resolving many looming issues of illegal migra-
tion, refugee conflicts, and complexities of interstate border crossing.
Under this premise, this chapter particularly discusses the plight of the
Rohingyas, an ethno-religious and linguistic minority of Myanmar, liv-
ing in Bangladesh as refugees and illegal migrants, beneath the complex
notions of citizenship.
Chapter 5 focuses on the vulnerable conditions of the stateless
people because the state, in various forms, regulates their everyday lives,
committing severe injustices and producing various inequalities in the
state structure. The notion of the modern nation state has produced
the concept of citizenship, rendering some people stateless. Since the
condition of statelessness sanctions that some people do not belong
to any state, they cannot claim any rights from any state and therefore
easily become subject to injustice, inequality, and discrimination and
18 The Rohingya

are even subjected to death. The treatment of stateless people as illegal

human bodies and as animals can be termed as ‘bare life’, as Agamben80
would argue. A life is ‘bare’ because it can be taken by anyone without
any legal intercession and without incurring the guilt of homicide, as
this life does not exist ‘before the law’. This chapter depicts a vivid pic-
ture of the Rohingyas, where the state intervenes in their everyday lives
amid the production and reproduction of vulnerabilities in order to
reconfirm their statelessness.
Chapter 6 presents a number of fresh ethnographic details that contain
the personal narratives of the recently arrived Rohingyas in Bangladesh,
following the horrifying campaign by the Myanmar security forces and
vigilantes. This chapter builds on 10 representative cases that unfold the
ground reality of what is happening with the Rohingyas in Rakhine State
and Bangladesh. These personal narratives unfold the degree of cruelty, the
level of atrocities, and the nature of brutality perpetrated by the Myanmar
security forces, ethnic extremists, and Buddhist fundamentalists, experi-
ences that are good enough to render the Rohingyas—a group of people
lesser than human beings—‘subhuman’. Presenting the atrocious condi-
tion of the Rohingyas, their existence in Rakhine State as illegal bodies,
their extreme uncertainty regarding what to do and whom to complain
to, their lived memories of being raped, punished, and killed, this chapter
brings out how their lives are ‘subhuman’.
Chapter 7 pays attention to the people’s critical ‘living condition-
ality’ created by the condition of statelessness, non-citizenship, and
refugee-hood. At the same time, rather than looking at such vulnerable
conditions as taken for granted for the stateless people, this chapter
critically engages with the body of scholarship on citizenship, asylum
seekers, stateless people, and refugees, arguing whether these theories
generated by academics otherwise are legitimizing the dehumanization
process perpetrated by the states in various forms. This chapter offers
a new perspective to contribute theoretically to the scholarship on the
stateless, non-citizens, asylum seekers, and refugees by critical engage-
ment with the idea of ‘bare life’, ‘rejected people’, ‘geontologies’, ‘state-
lessness’, and so on. It argues that there are many people living in this
world who possess citizenship and belong to a particular state but have
brutal experiences which are even more cruel than those faced by the
Rohingyas. So, the reasons do not essentially lie in the absence of citi-
zenship and non-recognition of the state, but they largely depend upon
 Introduction 19

the nature of the state and its perspectives towards people of different
ethnicities, religions, and ‘race’. Given the context, subhuman could be
a framework to understand the acute vulnerable conditions of people
and the nature of the state. It could also provide a new framework of
understanding genocide, ethnocide, ethnic cleansing, and domicide. In
my theorization, this chapter argues that ‘subhuman’ is a category of
people who are born in the human society but have no space in the
human community; they are born in the world, but the world does not
own them in any state structure, and they always live on the borderline
of ‘life’ and ‘death’. With ethnographic evidences, the chapter proves that
the way the Rohingyas are dealt with in both Myanmar and Bangladesh
shows that they are being treated as ‘subhuman’ since 1962.
Chapter 8 discusses the existing scholarship on the potential solu-
tion of the Rohingya problem with a critical examination of the roles
of regional political dynamics, South and Southeast Asian geopolitics,
bilateral and multilateral interstate relations, and the roles of the global
community. Following the latest influx in 2017, the local, national,
regional, and international partners; well-wishers; journalists; experts;
scholars; and international communities such as the United Nations (UN)
(and its organs like UNHCR, United Nations International Children’s
Education Fund [UNICEF]), IOM, International Labour Organization
(ILO), European Union (EU), Amnesty International (AI), Human
Rights Watch (HRW), Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the
United Kingdom, the United States of America, and the Arab League—are
calling for a permanent solution of the Rohingya problem. This chapter
raises the following questions: solution for whom? (for the Rohingyas,
who are not problem-creators); solution by whom? (by the international
community that cannot create any meaningful pressure on Myanmar);
and for what? (for bringing the Rohingyas back, whereas the Rakhine
State and its people are not ready to accept them at any cost). This
chapter finally attempts to explain some practical issues stemming from
the field through ethnographic studies regarding how the Rohingyas
think of changing their vulnerable and miserable lives in Bangladesh
and Myanmar. It ends with a practical proposal, echoing what I have
learned on the ground from my interaction with hundreds of Rohingyas,
that is, repatriation could be the enduring and sustainable solution of
the Rohingya crisis, but it should be done following three conditions:
legal recognition, social safety, and human dignity.
20 The Rohingya

Notes
1. It was circulated by the Myanmar state-sponsored media that 30 police
posts and 1 military base were simultaneously attacked by a so-called Rohingya
militant group known as the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), which
left many injured. Then a combined campaign began, and in the name of
counter-insurgency, Myanmar state forces cracked down on the civilian settle-
ment areas inhabited by the Rohingyas, particularly Maungdaw, Buthidaung,
and Thatchingdon. Detailed discussions can be found in this chapter and in
Chapters 2 and 3.
2. CNG scooter is a three wheeler that runs on CNG. The CNG scooters
are widely used as a common means of public transport in Ukhia and Teknaf
for short distances. They operate from Teknaf refugee camps to Ukhia refugee
camps. One CNG scooter can carry five passengers at a time.
3. Kutupalong is one of the two official camps located in Ukhia for the
Rohingya refugees. Another one is Nayapara located in Teknaf. It is worth men-
tioning here that Teknaf is the borderland of Bangladesh and Myanmar. A small
river called the Naf River is the demarcating water body between Bangladesh
and Myanmar. The Rohingyas have to cross the Naf River to migrate to Teknaf
in Bangladesh. Ukhia is an adjacent sub-district of Teknaf. The Rohingyas
usually cross the border and take shelter in Teknaf, and then gradually move
to Ukhia.
4. Balukhali is a temporary refugee camp built for the Rohingya refugees
who arrived after 25 August 2017, following the campaign against Rohingyas
by the Myanmar state forces in the name of counter-insurgency that I have
discussed in detail in various chapters. Balukhali is located in Ukhia.
5. This is the only road to travel from Cox’s Bazar town through Ukhia to
Teknaf. This road is still widely known as the Arakan Road since it was used
as the only connecting road between Chittagong and Arakan during the pre-
British, British, and even the post-British period. For details, see Nasir Uddin,
ed., To Host or To Hurt: Counter Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh
(Dhaka: Institute for Culture and Development Research [ICDR], 2012b).
6. Burqa is a particular kind of over-cloth that Muslim women usually wear
for maintaining purdah, a principle of Islamic dress code.
7. The IOM has worked to manage the shelter for the newly arrived
Rohingyas since the beginning of the influx on 25 August 2017. The UNHCR
was also working hard to manage the refugee situation. It was truly difficult for
IMO and UNHCR to tackle the massive refugee flow in 2017. Therefore, many
newly arrived Rohingyas had to wait for days to get registered in the temporary
refugee camps in Teknaf and Ukhia.
8. Rakhine Buddhists are called moghs by the Rohingyas.
 Introduction 21

9. See, for details, Frantz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth (England: Penguin
Books, [1961] 2001).
10. The political history of Burma’s transition to Myanmar has been dis-
cussed in detail in this chapter and in Chapter 2.
11. For details, see Penny Green, Thomas MacManus, and Alicia de la Cour
Venning, Countdown Annihilation: Genocide in Myanmar (London: International
State Crime Initiative, 2015); Azeem Ibrahim, The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s
Hidden Genocide (London: Hurst & Company, 2016); Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas,
but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka:
Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b); K. Fahmida Farzana, Memories of Burmese
Rohingya Refugees: Contested Identities and Belonging (London: Palgrave MacMillan,
2017); Nasir Uddin, ‘Ethnic Cleansing of the Rohingya People,’ in The Palgrave
Handbook of Ethnicity, ed. S. Ratuva (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019a).
12. A detailed description of my fieldwork has been discussed in the later
part of this chapter.
13. The citizenship of the Rohingyas was taken away in 1982 by enacting
the Myanmar Citizenship Law, which conferred citizenship to 135 national
races excluding the Rohingyas. Detailed discussions are in Chapters 1, 2, and 3.
14. For details, see Sarah Donovan, Genocide Literature in Middle and
Secondary Classrooms: Rhetoric, Witnessing, and Social Action in a Time of Standards
and Accountability (UK and USA: Routledge, 2016).
15. See Amy Hungerford, The Holocaust of Texts: Genocide, Literature and
Representation (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2003).
16. By ‘at present’, I mean the ‘post-2017 influx’ of the Rohingya refugee
situation in Bangladesh because recent counter-insurgency campaigns by the
Myanmar security forces, started on 25 August 2017, triggered the influx of
more than 750,000 Rohingyas in addition to over 500,000–550,000 Rohingyas
already existing in Bangladesh. Therefore, in terms of demographic composi-
tion, Bangladesh is currently hosting about 1.3 million Rohingyas, which is the
highest in number across the world.
17. All Rohingyas currently living in Bangladesh are not officially designated
as refugees. The Rohingyas who live in the official refugee camps in Nayapara
in Teknaf and Kutupalong in Ukhia are officially refugees while the rest are
now illegal Rohingyas. Recently, the Bangladesh government prepared a bio-
metric database of more than one million Rohingyas who are officially termed
as ‘forcibly displaced Myanmar nationals’. According to official statistics, there
are 32,000 Rohingya refugees. Details have been provided in the subsequent
chapters.
18. Rohingyas living in Bangladesh are now officially identified as forcibly
displaced Myanmar nationals (FDMN). In that case, Rohingyas can be termed
as ‘forcibly displaced persons’.
22 The Rohingya

19. The newly arrived Rohingyas are known as ‘asylum seekers’, but once
they get registered under the biometric database system, they become ‘forcedly
displaced Myanmar nationals’.
20. Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, trans.
D. Heller-Roazen (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998).
21. Myron Weiner, ‘Rejected Peoples and Unwanted Migrants in South Asia,’
Economic and Political Weekly 28, no. 34 (1993): 1737–46.
22. David Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of Non-citizens (USA: Oxford
University Press, 2008).
23. Kristy Belton, ‘Statelessness: A Matter of Human Rights,’ in The Human
Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept, ed. Rhoda Howard-Hassmann and
Margaret Walton-Roberts (Pennsylvania: The University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015), 31–44; Anna Fries, Memories of a Stateless Person (Bloomington:
AuthorHouse, 2013).
24. Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt
Books, 1994).
25. These ideas have been discussed in further detail in Chapters 2 and 7.
26. Nasir Uddin, ‘State of Stateless People: The Plight of Rohingya Refugees
in Bangladesh,’ in Human Rights to Citizens: A Slippery Concept, ed. Rhoda Howard
-Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts (USA: The University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015), 62–77.
27. Fries, Memories of a Stateless Person.
28. Rayner Thwaites, The Liberty of Non-citizens: Indefinite Detention in
Commonwealth Countries (UK: Hart Publishing, 2014).
29. Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).
30. See Nasir Uddin, ‘Life in Everyday Death: The Rohingyas in
Bangladesh and Myanmar,’ Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs,
Georgetown University, 19 October 2017a, accessed 25 April 2008, https://
berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/responses/life-in-everyday-death-the-rohingyas-
in-bangladesh-and-myanmar.
31. Arendt, Origins of Totalitarianism.
32. See, for details, Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of Non-citizens.
33. Mark Goodale, ed., Surrendering to Utopia: An Anthropology of Human
Rights (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2009).
34. Aradhana Sharma and Akhil Gupta, eds., The Anthropology of the State: A
Reader (USA, UK and Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2006).
35. Sian Lazar, ed., The Anthropology of Citizenship: A Reader (UK and USA:
Wiley-Blackwell, 2013).
36. Lazar, Anthropology of Citizenship.
 Introduction 23

37. Thomas H. Marshall, Citizenship and Social Class (London: Pluto Press,
[1950] 1992), 11; Kate Nash, ‘Between Citizenship and Human Rights,’ Sociology
43, no. 6 (2009): 1067–83.
38. Ruth Lister, ‘Inclusive Citizenship: Realizing the Potential,’ Citizenship
Studies 11, no. 1 (2007): 29; H. Mahdi, Gender and Citizenship: Hausa Women’s
Political Identity from the Caliphate to the Protectorate (Goteborg: Goteborg
University, 2006), 6.
39. Benhabib, The Rights of Others.
40. Miguel Almeida, ‘Citizenship and Anthropology: Perplexities of a
Hybrid Social Agent’ (paper presented at European Association of Social
Anthropologists [EASA] Conference, Copenhagen, 17 August 2002).
41. Katherine Tonkiss and Tendayi Bloom, ‘Theorising Noncitizenship:
Concepts, Debates and Challenges,’ Citizenship Studies 19, no. 8 (2016): 837.
42. Benhabib, Rights of Others; Margaret Somers, Genealogies of Citizenship:
Markets, Statelessness and the Right to Have Rights (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2008); Brad K. Blitz and Maureen Lynch, eds., Statelessness
and Citizenship: A Comparative Study on the Benefits of Nationality (Cheltenham,
UK and Northampton, MA, USA: Edward Elgar, 2011); Kristy Belton, ‘The
Neglected Non-citizen: Statelessness and Liberal Political Theory,’ The Journal
of Global Ethics 7, no. 1 (2011): 59–71; Lazar, Anthropology of Citizenship;
David Kinley, Wojciech Sadurski, and Kevin Walton, eds., Human Rights: Old
Problems, New Possibilities (Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA, USA:
Edward Elgar, 2013); Heather L. Johnson, Borders, Asylum and Global Non-
citizenship: The Other Side of the Fence (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2014); Emma Larking, Refugees and the Myth of Human Rights: Life
outside the Pale of the Law (London and New York: Routledge, 2014); Rhoda
Howard-Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts, eds., The Human Rights to
Citizenship: A Slippery Concept (Pennsylvania: The University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015).
43. Abdul Karim, The Rohingyas: A Short Account of Their History and Culture
(Chittagong: Arakan Historical Society, 2000).
44. Alaol (c. 1607–1680) was one of the greatest poets of medieval Bengali
literature. It is widely known that one day while Alaol and his father were going
to Chittagong by boat, they were attacked by Portuguese pirates who killed his
father and injured Alaol. The wounded Alaol was taken to Arakan as a prisoner
where he first worked as a bodyguard but was later employed in teaching music
and drama. Later on, he became one of the leading poets of medieval Bengali
literature with the patronization of the then Arakan king. For details, see
‘Alaol,’ Banglapedia, accessed 27 April 2018, http://en.banglapedia.org/index.
php?title=Alaol.
24 The Rohingya

45. Abdur Razzak and Mahfuzul Haque, A Tale of Refugees: Rohingyas in

Bangladesh (Dhaka: Centre for Human Rights, 1995).
46. Imtiaz Ahmed, ed., The Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas (Dhaka: The
University Press Limited, 2010).
47. Uddin, To Host or To Hurt.
48. M. Ali Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations (Kolkata: Firma KLM Private
Limited, 2004); Mohibullah Siddiquee, ed., The Muslims in Arakan: History and
Heritage (Chittagong: The Arakan Historical Society, 2000); Mahfuzur Rahman
Akhanda, The History of Muslims in Arakan (in Bengali) (Dhaka-Chittagong:
Bangladesh Co-operative Book Society, 2013); Habib Ullah, The History of
Rohingyas (Chittagong: Bangladesh Co-operative Society, [1995] 2015).
49. See for details, Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations.
50. Siddiquee, The Muslims in Arakan.
51. Akhanda, The History of Muslims in Arakan.
52. Mahfuzur Rahman Akhanda, The Rohingya Problem and Bangladesh (in
Bengali) (Rajshahi: Porilekh, 2018).
53. Ullah, The History of Rohingyas.
54. Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royaingas.
55. Gawher Nayeem Wahra, ‘Women Refugees in Bangladesh,’ Gender and
Development 2, no. 1 (1994): 45–9.
56. Eileen Pittaway, ‘The Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: The Failure of the
International Protection Regime,’ in Protracted Displacement in Asia: No Place to Call
Home, ed. Howard Adelman (London and New York: Routledge, 2008), 83–104.
57. Utpala Rahman, ‘Rohingya Refugees: A Security Dilemma for
Bangladesh,’ Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 8, no. 2 (2010): 139–61.
58. Chris Lewa, Unregistered Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Crackdown,
Forced Displacement and Hunger (Bangkok: The Arakan Project, 2010).
59. Kristy Crabtree, ‘Economic Challenges and Coping Mechanisms in
Protracted Displacement: A Case Study of the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’
Journal of Muslim Mental Health 5, no. 1 (2010): 41–58.
60. Victoria Palmer, ‘Analysing Cultural Proximity: Islamic Relief Worldwide
and the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’ Development in Practice 21, no. 1
(2011): 96–108.
61. A.K.M. Ahsan Ullah, ‘Rohingya Refugees to Bangladesh: Historical
Exclusion and Contemporary Marginalization,’ Journal of Immigration and
Refugee Studies 9, no. 2 (2011): 139–61.
62. Syeda Naushin Parnini, ‘Crisis of the Rohingya as Muslim Minority in
Myanmar and Bilateral Relations with Bangladesh,’ Journal of Muslim Minority
Affairs 33, no. 2 (2013): 281–97.
63. Susan Hutchinson, ‘Gendered Insecurity in the Rohingya Crisis,’
Australian Journal of International Affairs 72, no. 1 (2017): 1–9.
 Introduction 25

64. Jobair Alam, ‘The Rohingya of Myanmar: Theoretical Significance of the

Minority Status,’ Asian Ethnicity 19, no. 2 (2018): 180–210.
65. For example, Médecins Sans Frontiers, 10 Years for The Rohingya Refugees
in Bangladesh: Past, Present and Future, 2002, accessed 29 July 2019. www.rna-
press.com/data/itemfiles/5ae98e43d068cb749b3060b002601b95.pdf.
66. Ibrahim, The Rohingyas.
67. Farzana, Memories of Burmese Rohingya Refugees.
68. Francis Wade, Myanmar’s Enemy Within: Buddhist Violence and the Making
of a Muslim ‘Other’ (London: ZED Books, 2017).
69. S.B. Ray Chaudhury and Ranabir Samaddar, ed., The Rohingya in
South Asia: People without a State (London and New York: Routledge, 2018).
70. Anthony Ware and Constas Laoutides, Myanmar’s ‘Rohingya’ Conflict
(London: Hurst & Company, 2018).
71. M. Safi, ‘Myanmar Treatment of Rohingya looks like “Textbook Ethnic
Cleansing”, Says UN,’ Guardian, 11 September 2017, accessed 28 October 2018,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017sep/11/un-myanmars-treatment-
of-rohingya-textbook-example-of-ethnic-cleansing.
72. Vasan Para means mobile village. The Rohingyas first come to Teknaf
after crossing the Naf River. Then they stay in Teknaf for a short period of time
before moving to other places, particularly to Ukhia. Since the Rohingyas use
the space of Teknaf as their transit to move to other places, I metaphorically call
my research site in Teknaf a mobile village or ‘Vasan Para’.
73. Pasan Para literarily means a cruel village. The Rohingyas cross the bor-
der and initially take shelter in Teknaf. After a few days/weeks/months, many
of them move from Teknaf to Ukhia. After they arrive in Ukhia, the Rohingyas
try to stay for a longer term as they do not have any other place to go to and,
therefore, they usually settle down in Ukhia. Since they stay here for a longer
period of time, they interact with the local people and are sometimes involved
in various forms of conflicts of interest. The locals also blame the Rohingyas for
many of their problems and miseries, which the Rohingyas consider as ‘cruel’
behaviour towards them. Considering the Rohingya perspective, I metaphori-
cally use the pseudonym ‘Pasan Para’ for my research site in Ukhia. Though it
is a simple village name, it contains some sort of reality.
74. As a local resident of Cox’s Bazar, both the villages are familiar to me,
three of my relatives live there and hence I had easy access to the villagers.
75. Confrontations over accusations of cow stealing made by Bengali
families against the Rohingyas, the raping of a Rohingya girl by a local Bengali,
and the arrest of the Rohingyas by police in connection with militant activities
are the reasons why these villages regularly appear in local and national dailies.
76. I met the diaspora Rohingyas living in Waterloo-Kitchenware in 2012
and 2017. I met as many as 20 Rohingyas there, discussed many issues with
26 The Rohingya

them, and interviewed them. I also met some Rohingyas in Toronto in 2017 and
interviewed them regarding the massive campaign against Rohingyas that took
place in August 2017.
77. I interviewed a few Rohingyas in Germany in 2013 when I was a visiting
fellow at the South Asia Institute, Heidelberg University. They had migrated to
Thailand in 2012 and then subsequently shifted to Germany. I recorded their
experience of migration from Rakhine State to Thailand and from Thailand to
Germany.
78. I interviewed the Rohingya diaspora living in Bradford, London, in 2014
and 2018. I met many Rohingya activists and online bloggers in London in 2018
and met several Rohingyas in Malaysia in 2019.
79. For details, see Martyn Hammersley and Paul Atkinson, Ethnography:
Principles in Practice (UK and USA: Routledge, 2007).
80. Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, trans. by
D. Heller-Roazen (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998).
 Who Are the Rohingya?
2 Life through Roshang, Arakan,
and Rakhine State

D uring the course of over two decades of my engagement with the

Rohingyas as a researcher, I asked many Rohingyas across gen-
erations three simple questions: Why are you known as the Rohingyas?
What has made the Rohingyas distinct from others? How are you dif-
ferent from Bengalis? The many Rohingyas whom I have met and inter-
viewed in Ukhia, Teknaf, and other places1 since 1997 have time and
again told me, ‘Araa baali na, araa rooinga’,2 which translates to ‘We are
not Bengalis, we are Rohingyas.’ They also said, ‘Rooinga jatee3 have their
own language, own ethnic history, and own culture. So, Rooinga jatee
can never be Bengalis.’ In the two villages where I have been working
for years, local Bengalis also often identify them as Rooinga. My host
in Pasan Para, one of the two research sites where I have been carrying
out ethnographic fieldwork for years, explained to me one day in 2015:
‘The Rooinga can never be Bengalis. Their behaviour, their attitudes,
and their dealings with others are totally different from Bengalis. Their
language, the vocabulary they use, the way they wear clothes, and the
way they walk clearly distinguishes them from others. In fact, they are
not Bengalis, they are Rooinga. Truly speaking, Rooinga can never be
Bengalis.’ The two contested narratives, which are not essentially ‘two’
but represent hundreds of similar narratives as such, confirm the fact that
the Rohingyas are not Bengalis due to their social and cultural markers
and their ‘material and non-material culture’—what renowned anthro-
pologist Fredrik Barth called ‘social organisation of cultural differences’.4

The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
28 The Rohingya

When thinking about ethnic identity formation, I specifically take

the framework proposed by Fredrik Barth, who very conspicuously dis-
cussed how the identity of an ethnic group takes shape in ‘association
and interaction with others’. Barth talked about ethnic boundary, explain-
ing that an ethnic group maintains its social and cultural boundary in
association with other ethnic groups.5 Through interaction and close
associations with others, a person (A) can recognize that s/he (A) is dif-
ferent from the other (B) and the other (B) also distinguish the person
concerned (A) as distinct from them (B). Barth called it ‘social organisa-
tions of cultural differences’ where cultural differences mark boundaries
between and among groups that help form ethnic identity. Many scholars6
explain the attributes of an ethnic group—when people feel that they
belong to a particular group, they believe that they are the descendants
of the same group, they feel ownership towards this group, the group
also owns them, they feel a sense of difference from others, and others
also admit and acknowledge that. These characteristics make an ethnic
group. When contrasted with one another, the above statement that the
Rohingyas feel that they belong to a particular ethnic group, distinct
and separate from the Bengalis, as well the reverse perception of the
latter community, we understand how each of the communities see and
experience each other.
What then explains Myanmar’s attempt at establishing a narrative
wherein Rohingyas are not the citizens of Myanmar7 but they are,
in fact, illegal Bengali migrants in Myanmar?8 Myanmar insists that
the Rohingyas are Bengalis, and hence, cannot live in Rakhine State.
Questions of citizenship and non-citizenship will be discussed in the
subsequent chapters. Meanwhile, this chapter tries to answer some
questions regarding the identity and ethnicity of the Rohingyas.
The leading questions the chapter addresses are: Who are the
Rohingyas? How did they come to be termed as the Rohingyas? When
and how did they appear in the demographic composition of Arakan
or what is now called the Rakhine State? Before unearthing why the
Rohingyas now lead miserable lives in both Bangladesh and Myanmar,
we first need to know the history and ethnology of the Rohingyas. This
chapter brings in the historical trajectory of the Muslim settlement
in this region, dating back to ‘the eighth century when Arab traders
first came to the northern Arakan state and got settled down there’.9
The chapter also critically engages with the debate on whether the
 Who Are the Rohingya? 29

emergence of Muslims in Arakan essentially laid down the foundation

of the Rohingya ethnicity or becoming Rohingya was related to their
distinctive social practices, cultural heritage, and the continuity of a
particular ethnicity. Towards this objective, the chapter explores, along
with the Rohingya identity, the historical chronology of different politi-
cal upheavals that have gradually pushed them to the margin of the
state. It sets out to enter into the realm of the Rohingyas with a critical
reconsideration of the ethnic, regional, and political history of Arakan/
Rakhine State of Burma/Myanmar across time.

Rohang, Rowsang, and the Rohingyas

According to a popular saying, ‘Rohingyas are the inhabitants of
Rohang, Rowsang or Rosaing which is the earlier name of Arakan now
known as Rakhine state. Mrohong was the original Arakanese word of
Rohang and Rohingyas were the inhabitants of Mrohong [Rohang].’10
In the medieval works of the poets of Arakan and Chittagong, such
as Quazi Daulat, Mir Mardan, Shamser Ali, Quraishi Magan Thakur,
Alaol, Abdul Ghani, and others, they frequently referred to Arakan as
‘Roshang’, ‘Roshanga’, ‘Roshango Shar’, and ‘Roshango Des’11 in their writings.
However, the origin of the words ‘Arakan’, ‘Rohang’, and ‘Rohingyas’ is
controversial since many historians12 are of different opinions over the
issue. Arakan is an old coastal country of the Southeast Asian region.
Historian Mohibullah wrote:

The word Arakan is definitely of Arabic or Persian origin having the

same meaning in both these languages. It is the corruption of the word
Arkan plural of the word Al-Rukun. … In fact, the name of Arakan is of
much antiquity. In Ptolemy’s Geografia (150 CE) it was named ‘Argyre’.
Early Buddhist missionaries called Arakan as ‘Rekkha Pura’. In the Ananda
Chandra stone pillar of Chandra dynasty (8th Century) at Shitthaung
Pagoda in Mrauk-U the name of Arakan was engraved as ‘Arakades’s’. In a
Latin Geography (1597 CE) by Peta Vino, the country was referred to as
‘Aracan’. Friar Manrique (1628–43 CE) mentions the country as Aracan.13

Arab ‘geographer Rashiduddin (1310 CE) wrote it as “Rahan or

Raham”, a British traveller Relph Fitch (1586 CE) called it “Rocon” and
Rennell’s map (1771 CE) depicted it as “Rassawn”. Even Tripura Chronicle
“Rajmala” mentions the name of Arakan as Roshang.’14 Famous European
30 The Rohingya

traveller Francis Buchanan mentioned Arakan as Roung, Rossawn, and

Russawn interchangeably.15 ‘Today the Muslims of Arakan call the coun-
try “Rohang” or “Arakan” and call themselves “Rohingya” or native[s] of
Rohang. The Maghs [sic] call themselves “Rakhine” and call the country
“Rakhine Pye” or country of Rakhine.’16
Based on A.S. Bahar’s PhD dissertation,17 M.A. Alam codifies the
origin of the Rohingyas as follows: ‘Rohang, the old name of Arakan,
was [a] very familiar region for the Arab seafarers even during the
pre-Islamic days. Hence, the Rohingya Muslims, whose settlements in
Arakan date back to seventh century CE are not an ethnic group which
developed from one tribal group affiliation or single racial stock.’18
Many renowned historians are of the opinion that the Rohingyas are
not a unique ethnic group, but a group developed from different
stocks of people.19 However, the Rohingyas are predominantly Muslim
by religion with a distinct culture, social-cultural organization, and
civilization of their own. ‘[The Rohingyas] trace their ancestry to Arabs,
Moors, Pathans, Moghuls, Central Asians, Bengalis and some Indo-
Mongoloid people. Since Rohingyas are [a] mixture of many kinds of
people ... the Rohingyas of Arakan still carried the Arab names, faith,
dress, music and customs.’20 So, ‘the Rohingyas are nationals as well as
an indigenous ethnic group of Burma. They are not [a] new born racial
group of Arakan; rather they are as old an indigenous race of the coun-
try as any others.’21 This historical record and the earlier history of their
settlement in the Arakan region, then known as Rohang, Rowshang,
or Rohaing, also challenges and discards the latest state discourse that
the Rohingyas are not the inhabitants of Myanmar but illegal Bengali
migrants. I will discuss this in detail later in the book.

The Rohingya: History

In order to identity Rohingya ethnicity, there is a common tendency to
dig into the historical background,22 particularly the trend of tracing
the time frame of when the Rohingyas first appeared in the demo-
graphic composition of Burma, now known as Myanmar.23 The state of
Myanmar has produced a narrative of timing regarding the demographic
appearance of the Rohingyas. What the Myanmar state says about the
Rohingyas could be summarized thus: the Rohingyas are not the inhab-
itants of Myanmar and they have never been permanent residents of
 Who Are the Rohingya? 31

Burma. The Rohingyas are ‘illegal Bengali migrants’ who migrated to the
Rakhine State during the British colonial period. The British brought a
large number of Bengalis from then Bengal to British Burma for vari-
ous reasons including agriculture, fishing, and other manual labour.
The Rohingyas are not Burmese people at any level in the history of
Burma. Their religion, culture, language, and physical appearance are
different from that of Burmese people but similar to that of South
Asians. These sorts of state narratives have been supported by some
pro-Myanmar writers,24 some military-backed historians,25 and some
extremist Burmese writers.26 However, the emergence of Islam in
the Arakan state, the history of colonization and decolonization, and
the history of people’s settlement in this region do not support the
state narratives of Myanmar.
There are five historical narratives regarding when and how Muslims
arrived in Arakan, which is considered as the marker of the beginning
of the preaching of Islam in this region. First, there is a legend which
states that Hazrat Mohammad Bin Hanafi ([R] indicates one of the
prophets in the history of Islam), the son of the fourth khalifa of Islam,
first came to northern Rakhine State, what is now called Maungdaw, in
680 CE after their defeat in the Karbala war.27 During that time, northern
Rakhine State was ruled by a queen named Kheyapari. Hazrat Hanafi
engaged in warfare with Kheyapari, defeated her, and married her
afterwards. Legend says that all her followers were converted to Islam,
which marked the beginning of Islam in this region. In support of this
legendary narrative, many contemporary scholars28 argue that there
are two small hill peaks called Hanafi and Kheyapari Tongo or Tonki29
still existing in Maungdaw, which testify to the legend of Hanafi and
Kheyapari. This is because it is presumed that these two hill peaks were
named after Hanafi and Kheyapari.30 Unfortunately, this legend has no
authentic source and, therefore, has not been academically justified till
date. Besides, scholars who used this legend to trace Islam in Arakan
could not provide any valid source of Hanafi’s arrival and settlement
in northern Arakan.31 One of the lyrics of Barid Shah32 is used as the
source of this legend, which could be really difficult to authenticate
academically.
The second batch of Muslims arrived in Arakan in the eighth
century when Arab traders took shelter here after their ship was
wrecked on the banks of the Rumbi River.33 It was during the tenure
32 The Rohingya

of Mohathaing Sandia (788–810 CE) that the traders took shelter in

Arakan. According to historical accounts, some traders and soldiers
died while the remaining ones accepted the kind shelter offered by
King Sandia and stayed in Arakan. Those traders and soldiers came to
be known as Kular or foreigners in the history of Arakan.34 They started
living in Arakan henceforth, got married, established families, gave
birth to new generations, and continued lineages. They are considered
the ancestors of today’s Rohingya populace. It is then that the Muslims
appeared in the demographic map of Arakan and Islam took its place
in this region.35 The third track of history regarding the appearance
of Muslims in Arakan took place in 1430. The then Arakanese king
Mun Shaw Moon alias Normikhla was in frequent conflicts with the
Burmese king. Following a couple of small-scale attacks, the Burmese
king finally captured Arakan and ousted the Arakan king in 1406. After
this attack, the fall of the Arakan king, and his subsequent shelter in
Bengal, there is a wonderful observation recorded by a noted historian
of Arakan, A.P. Phayre: ‘Apprehending trouble [from Burmese King],
the king of Arakan made communication with the king of Bengal,
established friendly relations with him and both king[s] exchanged
presents.’36 In fact, this friendly relation became very effective, and
hence, the king of Bengal sheltered the king of Arakan after he was
defeated by the king of Burma. Having failed to protect himself and
his kingship, the then Arakanese king, known as Mun Shaw Moon
alias Normikhla, fled his homeland and took shelter in Gorh, the then
capital city of Bengal. At that time, Bengal was ruled by Sultan Gias
Uddin Azam Shah. Normikhla stayed in Gorh for about 26 years and
recaptured his lost throne and kingdom in 1430 with the help of the
30,000 soldiers provided by Sultan Jalal Uddin Mohammad Shah.37
After regaining his throne, Normikhla wanted the Bengali soldiers
to stay in Arakan to protect the region from any further attack by the
Burmese king. During this time, Rohang was made capital of Arakan
state. Normikhla provided land and space for the 30,000 soldiers from
Bengal who settled in Arakan. Most of them got married in Arakan and
settled there. According to many historians, Normikhla took a Muslim
known as Sulaiman Shah and introduced coinage in Arabic fonts as
an acknowledgement of the help provided by the sultan of Gorh. In
the history of Arakan, this batch of settlement is recorded as the third
phase of Muslim settlement in this region.38
 Who Are the Rohingya? 33

The fourth phase of Muslim settlement in Arakan was recorded

when Shah Suja arrived in 1660 CE. Shah Suja was defeated by Mir
Jumla, the commander-in-chief of the Mughal battalion, during the
rule of Emperor Aurangzeb. According to many historians, Shah Suja
had planned to visit Mecca and then shift to Turkey or Iran for political
asylum. However, the weather conditions were not favourable and
this made him think of taking shelter in the nearby Arakan region. In
response to the assurance of the then Arakanese king, Shah Suja, with
his family, relatives, bodyguards, security soldiers, caretakers, cooks, fol-
lowers, advisors, carriers, domestic servants, and trusted soldiers, took
shelter in Arakan for his safety.39 Later on, Shah Suja, his family, and his
bodyguards were all killed as a part of a conspiracy that was executed
by the Arakanese king. One narrative of this conspiracy recorded by
some historians40 claims that Shah Suja had a daughter named Amena
Begum who was renowned for her beauty and attributes. The Arakanese
king fell in love with her and offered to marry her, but Suja rejected
this offer. This is said to be the reason why the king killed Shah Suja
along with all his family members on 7 February 1661.41 However, the
number of soldiers Shah Suja took with him while taking shelter remains
uncertain as there are no proper historical records of it.
The historian Karim assumed that the number of soldiers could be
between five hundred and one thousand.42 After Shah Suja’s assasina-
tion, the remaining soldiers were allowed to stay in Arakan. They got
married to the locals and settled down there. This group of people were
Muslims and their offsprings formed a large part of the Muslim com-
munity in Arakan; they were later known as Kamanchi.43
The fifth phase of Muslims’ arrival in Arakan was historically recorded
in 1824 when the British were occupying Arakan and Burma. From
1430 to 1784, Arakan was an independent state until the Burmese King
Bodawpaya captured it once again and controlled it until 1824. Soon
after Bodawpaya occupied Arakan, hundreds of thousands of Rakhine
Buddhists and Arakanese Muslims took shelter in Bengal as a frontier
territory. After 40 years of Burmese occupation, the British captured
the Arakan state and, thereafter, a large number of Muslims and
Hindus returned to Arakan. It should also be noted here that during
those 40 years, many grew old and died, and hence could not return.
Besides, many of them became involved in various occupations and
businesses, got married in Bengal, and chose not to return. A new
34 The Rohingya

group of Muslims and Hindus migrated to Arakan during the British

colonial period as economic migrants.44
Following the fifth phase of Muslim arrival and settlement in Arakan,
it is clear that Islam and Muslims have been a part of Arakan history for
more than a thousand years. The emergence of Islam and the demo-
graphic appearance of Muslims do not necessarily confirm that the
history of Muslims and Islam is the history of the Rohingya in Arakan
state. This is so because, even with the arrival of Hanafi in 680 CE Arab
traders in the eighth century, Gorh soldiers in 1430, Kamanchi in 1660,
and the return of Muslims to Burma during the British period, they were
not Rohingyas as such as none claimed themselves as Rohingyas and
no historical records said so. Therefore, there is hardly any scope for
controversy that Islam emerged in Arakan and the Muslims appeared
in the demographic composition of Arakan more than thousands of
years ago as many authentic historical records justify it.45 Besides, many
renowned historians on Arakan also endorsed the thousand years of his-
tory of Islam and Muslims in Arakan,46 but no record has endorsed that
the history of Muslims is the history of Rohingyas in Arakan.47 Many
researchers,48 Rohingya activist-historians,49 and scholars50 sympathetic
to the Rohingyas have been struggling to establish the theory that the
arrival of Muslims in Arakan is the origin of the Rohingyas in Burma,
but it does not stand because the Arab traders, if we take them as the first
arrival of Muslims on record, were not Rohingyas under any circum-
stances. It is easily understandable and more sensible to draw a conclu-
sion that with the combination of many trends of people—like Arabs,
Moorse, Pathan, Mughals, and Bengalis—their lifestyles, languages, and
cultures, the Rohingyas have emerged as a distinctive ethnic community
in Arakan state over the years. So, in that consideration, the Rohingyas
are a ‘mixed race’51 since there is no ‘pure race’ in this world.52
It altogether confirms two issues: First, Myanmar’s state narratives
about the Rohingyas that they are not the inhabitants of Burma but are
illegal Bengali migrations from the British colonial period is, at best,
‘manufactured history,’ invented to support the execution of Myanmar’s
state policy to drive the Rohingyas out of the country.
Second, the Rohingyas, particularly their ancestors, have been the
inhabitants of Arakan for more than one thousand years since the emer-
gence of Islam and arrival of Muslims in this region. The Rohingyas are
a mixed ‘race’ formed over centuries evolved through the combination
 Who Are the Rohingya? 35

of many different communities, and now, they constitute a particular

ethnic category having their distinctive language, culture, and social
organization with the adoption of Islamic culture at large.

The Rohingya: Politics

The present state of Myanmar is deliberately utilizing this academic and
historical vacuum to justify various sorts of discrimination and atrocities
against the Rohingyas. Myanmar claims that the Rohingyas were never
the residents of Burma and that they migrated to Arakan from Bengal
during the British colonial period, 1824 onwards. Myanmar used this
state narrative in the formulation of its citizenship law enacted in 1982,
where the eligibility criteria was set favouring those whose ancestors
were living in Burma ‘before’ the British colonized this territory. Under
this clause, the Rohingyas were stripped off their citizenship claims and
rights in accordance with the state’s official claim.
Such a politics of exclusion was based on systematically manufac-
tured historical truth-claims. Records such as the ones I describe next
indicate the presence of the Rohingyas in Burma long before the British
colonized Burma. In order to dismantle the Myanmar state narrative,
I will cite four authentic historical records that have been used as ref-
erence points to locate the Rohingyas in the historical-demographic
canvas of Arakan.53
Francis Hamilton Buchanan is a known historian and his travel
notes have been recognized as globally accepted historical documents.
In 1799, he published an article titled ‘A Comparative Vocabulary of
Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire’ in the journal
Asiatic Researcher. Buchanan categorically mentioned that he talked to
a group of people living in the Arakan region who identified them-
selves as Rooinga.54 This is supposed to be the first publicly available
record of the Rooinga. Before this record, there were many indications,
notations, and historical evidences—which I describe next—that cor-
roborate the presence of an ethno-linguistic group, the Rohingyas, in
Arakan, but these were recorded in a plurality of names. Buchanan, for
the first time, recorded the presence of the Rohingyas by using their
self-identification as ‘Rooinga’. It is to be mentioned here that almost
all Rohingyas still identify themselves as ‘Rooinga,’ as described in the
beginning of this chapter.55
36 The Rohingya

The Classical Journal has often been considered as the historical

baseline, to some extent, of the people of the Southeast Asian region.
In one of the Classical Journal issues published as early as 1811, there is
a clear indication that a group of people who were living in the Arakan
region called themselves Rooingas and were speaking in the Rooinga
language.56 It is also worth mentioning here that the Classical Journal
of 1811 has been used as one of the few credible historical records for
the early history of Burma.57 Many internationally acclaimed scholars
have used the Classical Journal of 1811 as the basic historical source for
writing the history of Arakan.58
In the early nineteenth century, another written record of the lan-
guages spoken by the people living in the Arakan region was found.
A German ethnologist named Johann Severin Vater had edited a book
on the languages of ethnic groups who were then living in Arakan
state, which was published in 1815.59 Vater mentions the name of an
ethnic group that identifies itself as Ruinga or what is now known as
Rohingya. According to Vater, these the Ruinga people were speaking in
a particular language, which they called the Ruinga language.60
Walter Hamilton wrote a book titled A Geographical, Statistical, and
Historical Description of Hindostan and the Adjacent Countries,61 where
he clearly stated that ‘the Moguls know this country by the name of
Rakhang, and the Mahomeddans, who have been long settled in this
country call themselves Rooinga or the natives of Arracan’.62 Hamilton’s
statement historically authenticates three important facts:63

1. A group of people identified themselves by the name Rooinga. It

means that Rohingyas were living in Arracan (Arakan) long before
1824 when the British colonized Burma.
2. ‘Rooinga people have been long settled there’ indicates that the
Rohingyas had been living in Arakan centuries before 1824.
3. The Rooinga were the natives of Arakan even in 1820 when the book
was published and four years before the British colonized Burma. It
clearly indicates that the Rohingyas have been the natives of Arakan
(now Rakhine State) for centuries.

Apart from the records I have presented and explained elsewhere,

there are other historical records showing Rohingyas’ presence in
Arakan before 1824.64 However, I am not going into further details
 Who Are the Rohingya? 37

here because this chapter is not about the identity and ethnicity of the
Rohingyas.
Sources such as the ones I referred to earlier were documented during
the period 1784–1824 when Burma occupied the Arakan region, pre-dating
the British colonization of the Arakan region. To cite Azeem Ibrahim,

Thus there is a plentiful evidence of the existence of the Rohingyas in

Arakan by the early nineteenth century in a sequence of works published
at the time. None of these sources had any partial political interest in
the ethnic make of this regions; none of them has any reason to invent
such a new group like Rohingyas any more than they had an interest in
suppressing such groups, and all clearly point to the fact that there was
a major ethnic group in the region with a distinct language at the time
clearly identifiable as Rohingyas [sic].65

It should also be mentioned here that Burma occupied and ruled the
Arakan state only for 66 years (first, for 26 years from 1406 to 1430;
and the second time, for 40 years from 1784 to 1824) during the 2,000
years of history of independent Arakan. Myanmar’s claims regarding
the ownership of Arakan state are delegitimized if one were to follow
the trail of historical records. This also brings forth an interesting para-
dox: whether it was the Rohingyas or the Burmese who first migrated
and settled in Arakan or what we now call the Rakhine State. Since the
task at hand for this is an ethnography of the Rohingyas’ present condi-
tions, particularly the everyday forms of discrimination, their atrocious
living conditions, and extreme vulnerability, we will not be able to
delve deeper into the history of Arakan or the history of the Rohingyas.

The Rohingyas: Ethnicity

An ethnic identity claim is crucially tied to history, but is not limited
to history alone. Tracing ethnic identity and recognizing its legitimacy
cannot merely be based on the demographic appearance in a particular
region in a particular timeframe. Contemporary discourse is marked
with contestations and differences over agreeable standards of iden-
tification of an ethnic group or indigenous people. Within both the
academia and the political sphere, debates on the issue remain ripe. I
will present three central arguments here to help understand the iden-
tity of the Rohingyas.
38 The Rohingya

One: On the Question of Language, Ethnicity, and Identity

During my decade-long research engagement with the Rohingyas and
close observation of the Rohingya life as a local resident of Cox’s Bazar
for over two decades, I interacted with hundreds of Rohingyas and never
found anyone claim himself or herself to be Bengali. Numerous conver-
sations involved them identifying themselves as ‘rooinga’, which in the
English language becomes ‘Rohingyas’. The claim of the community’s
marked ethnic and linguistic difference from the Bengalis is one of the
key indicators of who the Rohingyas are and who they get recognized
as. The anthropological method demands that the community’s self-
identification take precedence over Myanmar state’s official narrative.
It is now widely known that ethnicity does not essentially come
across as a cultural idea in the twenty-first century as it has a strong
political edge, but it adapts and accommodates many elements of
culture in its articulation.66 Matters of political consciousness about
rights and entitlements are now considered very important in fram-
ing the idea of ethnicity. In general, some specific characteristics are
considered when determining the ethnic identity of a particular group
of people. These sociocultural variables include the community’s self-
identification as members of an ethnic group; a sense of belonging to
the said group; the sense of continuity as descendants of a certain group
of ancestors; the carrying ahead of social and cultural heritage; the feel-
ing of connectedness with that particular group—a community ethic;
consciousness; and the belief systems that they associate with. These
characteristics enable a community to establish their independent and
distinctive ethnic identity.67
There is also the long-standing theoretical grounding of the
renowned anthropologist Fredrik Barth to identify ethnic groups
based on the framework of ethnic boundary, as discussed briefly ear-
lier. Barth’s theoretical positioning is still widely used, even after five
decades of its formulation, for the identification of ethnic groups, since
it is universally recognized and academically accepted. Barth argues,
‘When a group of people think that they are a separate and distinct
ethnic group, which have their own socio-cultural-political heritage
and inheritance, and they all feel spiritually [connected] as members
of a particular ethnic group, and other ethnic groups think of them as
such, then this is their ethnic identity’.68 The Rohingyas all consider
 Who Are the Rohingya? 39

themselves as ‘rooinga’—as a people of the Rohingya ethnic group—

identifying as the inhabitants of Arakan. Their linguistic culture is dis-
tinct from the larger family of languages of Myanmar; and they see and
identify themselves as a distinct ethnic group within their particular
political reality. Whether in the Barthian framework or that of ethnic
boundaries, we can easily distinguish the Rohingya ethnicity.

Two: On Indigeneity
Globally, there has been and continues to be a widespread debate over
the universality of the definition of ‘indigenous people’ around themes
such as their identity and rights. After a long discussion at the UN’s vari-
ous councils and different forums, it was not possible to reach a generally
accepted definition of ‘indigenous people’. Therefore, the responsibil-
ity of definition and determination has been given to the indigenous
people in accordance with self-determination and self-definition (of
indigenous nations).69 However, there is an agreement on some fea-
tures that those who were living before the arrival of an intruder or
occupier of a particular area (it is related to the colonial experience
and applies to America, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) and still
live there are indigenous to the land. Those who have their own cul-
tures, customs, and values; those who identify themselves as part of a
separate collective sociocultural entity; and, in most cases, those who
are considered minorities in the society are called indigenous people.70
Moreover, the importance of self-determination and self-definition
has been given in the context of defining and identifying indigenous
people in the ILO convention.71 When a group of people living in the
framework of a state, who are a cultural minority, have their own culture
distinct from that of the cultural majority, and have a distinct cultural
heritage, inhereted trends, and are socially, economically, and politi-
cally marginalized in the structure of power and authority of the state,
can claim themselves as indigenous people.72 In this consideration, the
people of Kachin, Shan, Chin, Karen, Rakhain, Man, Kakon, Rohingyas,
and so on, claim to be indigenous people of Myanmar because they
are distinct from Bamar, the national majority. Myanmar has refused
to confer legitimacy and citizenship on the Rohingyas, claiming that
the Rohingyas are not ‘indigenous’ to Myanmar. Here, we need to keep
40 The Rohingya

in mind that ‘indigenous people’ and ‘earliest inhabitants’ are not

synonymous with one another.73 Therefore, ‘who came first’ and ‘who
the next was’ approach should not be the parameter for the identifica-
tion of indigenous people.74 It is important to remember that the word
‘indigenous’ signifies a cultural category, while the ‘earliest migrants’—
strictly speaking—refers to a demographic category. Myanmar claims
that those whose ancestors have been living in erstwhile Burma from
before 1824 are legitimate citizens of Myanmar. This claim, though,
also does not stand because the Rohingyas, yet recorded as Rooinga,
have been living in the Arakan region for centuries, which is histori-
cally and factually evident. The idea of indigenous people completely
mismatches with this state narrative. If we consider the internationally
recognized definition of ‘indigenous people’, and place it alongside the
Bamars’ state-formation history of Burma, we will find that the Bamars
emerged as the socially, economically, and politically dominant class
of the modern state of Burma/Myanmar.75 As a national majority
with majority representation backed by accumulation of power and
position in state management, they have been enabled to govern—or
should we say ungovern or misgovern—modern-day Myanmar, where
the Rohingyas have been relegated to the margins as a cultural, demo-
graphic, and religious minority. If the people living in marginalized
areas with their social and cultural differences are recognized as indig-
enous people globally,76 then why deny the Rohingyas of Myanmar
their due status as indigenous people? This is state’s politics of cultural,
religious, and racial discrimination.
A lethal mix of blatant structural exclusions, with factors such as
ethnic extremism, religious fundamentalism, military dictatorship or
proxy governance and administrative powers of the military, discrimi-
natory foundations to nation building, and a majoritarian approach of
state formation, have created a Myanmar that does not honour stan-
dards of international principles of peoples’ rights and dignity.

Three: People of the Soil and Political Representation

The Bengali community has a rhetorical phrase called vumi-putra, which
translates to ‘son of the soil’, which is not a gender-sensitive phrase. The
exclusion of the ‘daughter of the soil’ pushes us to think of a more
 Who Are the Rohingya? 41

gender-neutral or pan-gender phrase, such as ‘the people of the soil’.

The phrase ‘the people of the soil’ spiritually means the inhabitants of
a particular place,77 which involves deep attachment, belongingness,
and emotion between the people and the place.78 ‘The people of the
soil’ is used here as an analytical category in order to assert that the
Rohingyas are ‘people of the soil’ of Arakan, and thereby delegitimize
Myanmar’s claim that ‘they are illegal Bengali migrants’. In popular
knowledge, when a person lives in a certain land for years, succeeding
generations identify the land as ‘motherland’ or ‘fatherland’. There is
a gendered and parental notion attached to land and the earth across
cultures.79 I will use the discourse of ‘the people of the soil’ to elaborate
the Rohingyas’ active presence on the soil of Arakan.
The Myanmar state has established another narrative—that there
was no word like the ‘Rohingya’ used before the 1950s and that it was
a political category that came up as part of their political movement.80
It means that there were no Rohingyas in Burma before the 1950s.
Interestingly enough, many pro-Myanmar scholars have supported this
narrative and attempted to establish it with their writings, analyses, and
historical notes.81 Among other theories is one that claims that Abdul
Gaffar, a member of the Burmese Parliament, elected from Maungdaw,
wrote an article in the Guardian Daily on 25 August 1951, where he, for
the first time, used the word ‘Rohingyas’.82 Before that, there were no
‘Rohingyas’.
I present here some evidences that are good enough to assert that
the Rohingyas were ‘the people of the soil’ of Burma/Myanmar and
they had been living in Arakan centuries before 1951 as its permanent
inhabitants.
Rangoon University, Burma, was politically very vibrant during the
colonial period and even led the Independence movement during the
process of decolonization,83 and therefore, the Rangoon University
Central Students’ Union (RUCSU) was one of the leading and powerful
political platforms in Burma. A Rohingya leader named Rashid was the
elected vice-president of the RUCSU in 1936 and Bogyoke Aung San,
the father of Aung San Suu Kyi, was the secretary general of the same
committee.
Figure 2.1 shows the leaders of RUCSU sitting together with
Rashid, the vice-president of RUCSU, sitting in the middle with
42 The Rohingya

Figure 2.1 Rangoon University Central Students’ Union in 1936, where the
leading representatives were Rohingya Muslims (Rashid, Razzak)
Source: http://www.burmalibrary.org/docs14/ARAKAN-%20Question_of_Rohingyas_
Nationality-red.pdf, accessed on 30 October 2017.

Bogyoke Aung San and also the then secretary of RUCSU, on his
left. The photo was taken in 1936. Interestingly, RUCSU was led
by a Rohingya Muslim, while Bogyoke Aung San was serving as
his secretary. This photo strongly demonstrates that the Rohingyas
lived in Burma with a dominant political position even before
decolonization, and that they were leading an organization like
RUCSU.
Not only that, Rangoon University had a formal forum for the
Rohingya students called the Rangoon University Arakan Muslims
Association. There are a lot of evidences of various social and politi-
cal activities carried out by the Rangoon University Arakan Muslims
Association in the 1950s long before Burma became decolonized.84 It
also raises a valid question that if the Rohingyas were illegal Bengali
migrants—as Myanmar claims today—how did they get admission
in Rangoon University and how did they form an association with
their own name? The evidence of organizational activities in Rangoon
University in the 1950s clearly indicate a strong presence of the
Rohingya Muslims even in the political sphere of Burma long before
 Who Are the Rohingya? 43

its Independence. It also supports the claim that the Rohingyas are the
‘people of the soil’ of Arakan, which is now called Rakhine State.
Apart from this, Table 2.1 provides a list of the members of parlia-
ment (MPs) who were elected from the Rohingya communities and
represented the Rohingyas in the parliament of Burma (later Myanmar)
since 1936. Now, the question is: If the Rohingyas were illegal Bengali
migrants, how could they become MPs through modes of electoral
processes?
A steady history of political representation in the Parliament shows
that the Rohingyas have been, in fact, active subjects and inhabitants of

Table 2.1 List of MPs (period-wise)

Year Position Name of Candidate Area Represented

1936 MCC Mr Gani Marakan Buthidaung+
Maungdaw
1947 MLC U Pho Khaing Akyab West
(a) Nasir Uddin
MLC Mr Sultan Ahmed Maungdaw
MLC Mr Abdul Gaffar Buthidaung
1951 MP Mr Abdul Gaffar Buthidaung North
MP Mr Abul Bashar Buthidaung South
MP Mr Sultan Ahmed Maungdaw North
MP Daw Aye Nyunt Maungdaw South
(a) Zurah
1956 MP Mr Ezar Meah Buthidaung North
MP Mr Sultan Mahmood Buthidaung North
(By election)
MP Mr Abul Bashar Buthidaung South
MP Mr Sultan Ahmed Maungdaw North
MP Mr Abul Khair Maungdaw South
MP Mr Abdul Gaffar Both Maungdaw
(Upper House) and Buthidaung
1960 MP Mr Abul Bashar Buthidaung South
MP Mr Sultan Mahmood Buthidaung North
MP Mr Abul Khair Maungdaw South
MP Mr Rashid Maungdaw North
MP M.A. Subhan Both Maungdaw
(Upper House) and Buthidaung
(Cont’d)
44 The Rohingya

Table 2.1 (Cont’d)

Ma-Sa-La (BSPP) Period
Year Designation Name of Candidate Region Represented
1974 Hluttaw Member Dr Abdul Rahim Maungdaw
Mr Abul Hussein Buthidaung
1978 Hluttaw Member Mr Abdul Hai Maungdaw
(a) U Tun Aung Kyaw
SLORC Sponsored Elections
1990 Hluttaw Member Mr Fazal Ahmed Maungdaw South
U Chit Lwin Maungdaw North
(a) Ibrahim
U Tin Maung Buthidaung South
(a) Noor Ahmed
U Kyaw Min Buthidaung North
(a) Anwarul Haq
U Shwe Yat Akyab
Source: U Kway Min and Shamsul Anwarul Haque, An Assessment of the Question
of Rohingyas’ Nationality, accessed 30 October 2017, http://www.burmalibrary.org/
docs14/ARAKAN-%20Question_of_Rohingyas_Nationality-red.pdf.

Burma before the decolonization, long before its colonization by the

British, and later, by Burma. Manufactured narratives produced by
the state of Myanmar are challenged when juxtaposed with historical
evidence. The Myanmar state perpetuates this exclusion, depriving the
Rohingyas of their status as the ‘people of the soil’ of Arakan, Burma, or
what is now known as Rakhine State of Myanmar.

Ethnic Composition of the Rohingyas

The Rohingyas are the ethno-linguistic and religious minorities who
inhabit the northern part of Rakhine State (Arakan) in current-day
Myanmar.85 In Rakhine State, they comprised 25 per cent of the state’s
total population of 1,300,00086 until the displacement in 2016–18.
Arakan was an independent kingdom until 1784, when it
encompassed the Chittagong region in the southern part of today’s
Bangladesh. As stated in the previous sections, I would like to add
that the Arakanese had their first contact with Muslims in the eighth
century, when Arab merchants docked at an Arakan port on their way
 Who Are the Rohingya? 45

to China. ‘The Rohingyas are [claim to be] the descendants of [this

first group of Muslims] Moorish, Arab and Persian Traders, including
Mughal, Turk, Pathan and Bengali soldiers cum migrants, who arrived
between the ninth and fifteenth centuries, married local women, and
settled in the region.’87 The Burmese king Bodawpaya conquered and
annexed Arakan in 1784, triggering a long guerrilla war in which
the Burmese allegedly killed more than 200,000 Arakanese. A failed
attempt was made in 1796 to overthrow Burmese rule, resulting in
the exodus of two-thirds of the Muslim Arakanese into the neighbour-
ing Chittagong area.88 This marked the start of an influx of Arakanese
Muslim refugees into colonial Bengal. When the British incorporated
Arakan into their empire in 1885, many refugees returned. For centuries,
the Rakhine Buddhists89 and Arakanese Muslims lived together in the
territory until World War II. However, the advance of the Japanese
army in 1942 sparked both the exodus of thousands of Muslims and
the evacuation of the British from Arakan, creating a political void.
‘Communal riots between the Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingyas
erupted, and some 22,000 Muslims fled to adjoining British Indian
territories [now Chittagong and Chittagong Hill Tracts].’90
Shortly after Burma became independent in 1948, some Muslims
carried out an armed rebellion, demanding an independent Muslim
state within the Union of Burma. Though the rebellion was quashed
in 1954, Muslim distrust of the Burmese administration remained and
a backlash ensued that echoes even today. For example, ‘Muslims were
removed and barred from civil posts, restrictions on [their] movement
were imposed, and [their] property and land were confiscated.’91 Even
so, the Rohingyas, as Muslims, were close to having their separate eth-
nic identity and autonomy, formally recognized in the 1950s, under
the democratic government of U Nu, but these plans were thwarted
by the military coup of General Ne Win in 1962. In fact, 1962 is his-
torically considered as the beginning of the miseries of the Rohingyas,
since the state under the military dictatorship started applying arbitrary
rules that gradually pushed the Rohingyas to the margins of the society
and the state. However, the Rohingyas were officially still not stateless
people until 1982 when the Myanmar Citizenship Law was enacted.
The decolonization in 1948 led to the process of state formation
and nation building in Burma.92 Identities of various ethnic groups sur-
faced as the question of legitimacy in the discourse of the majoritarian
46 The Rohingya

notions of nationhood designed by Burman nationalists grew impor-

tant. The process became more complicated when military rulers domi-
nated the central political space and intervened in the policy framing
of the state. The politics of inclusion and exclusion governed the state
policy of nation building and state formation, which included some
but excluded others. Within this divide, the Rohingyas living in Arakan
were, in fact, part of the nation-building process and also included
in state formation until 1962, when the military took over control of
Burma. Ibrahim writes:

The democratic government of the Prime Minister U Nu in [the] 1950s

accepted that the Rohingyas were an indigenous ethnic group, but they
were not one of the named-ethnicity given full nationalities in the
Constitution of 1947. In a public speech on September 25, 1954 U Nu
stated: The Rohingya has the equal status of nationalities with Kachin,
Kayah, Karen, Mon, Rakhine and Shan.93

Since 1962, the history of the Rohingyas has been rife with exploita-
tion, persecution, and discrimination. General Ne Win (1962–88) and
his revolutionary council adopted a policy to suppress and oust the
Rohingya Muslims from the country by banning all Rohingya activi-
ties and socio-cultural organization. In 1978, he launched ‘Operation
Dragon’, which forced 250,000 Rohingyas to enter Bangladesh, causing
tremendous economic and political problems. Though most Rohingyas
returned to Myanmar in 1979 under an agreement between the two
countries, returnee Rohingyas became outsiders, despite having lived
in their homeland before. Finally, they were rendered stateless by the
Myanmar Citizenship Law of 1982, which conferred the right of citi-
zenship on members of 135 nationalities listed by the Government of
Myanmar (GoM), excluding the Rohingyas. Thus, we can see how the
laws of the modern nation state are implicated in the condition of the
Rohingyas today: ‘Denial of citizenship is the key mechanism of exclu-
sion, institutionalizing discrimination and arbitrary treatment against
this group. Severe restrictions on their movement and marriages,
arbitrary arrest, extortion, forced labour and confiscation of land are
imposed on them.’94
The Rohingyas fled Myanmar for a number of reasons, including
their atrocious living conditions, forced labour by military junta,
unexplainable persecution, confiscation of their land and material
 Who Are the Rohingya? 47

resources, restrictions on their movement that virtually confined them,

restrictions on their marriage and education, frequent communal riots
executed by Rakhine Buddhists against them, and the imposition of
various other restrictions on their freedom of choice and liberty. The
distinction between a refugee fleeing persecution and one seeking a
better life does not mean much to the Rohingyas since both are true.95
Hundreds of thousands of stateless Rohingyas fled brutal oppression
in Myanmar and migrated to Bangladesh, the neighbouring country,
where they found linguistic (Chittagong language)96 and religion
(Islamic) homogeneity with the people of the Chittagong region.
How many Rohingyas live in Bangladesh currently is unknown
because the exodus never stopped and new arrivals have no access to
the refugee camps; therefore, there is no official record of the unreg-
istered Rohingyas. However, following the recent influx that started
from 25 August 2017, Bangladesh has prepared a biometric registration
of more than one million Rohingyas97 as part of a repatriation pro-
cess where already present and newly arrived Rohingyas are enlisted.
Before this biometric registration process, prior to the massive influx
in 2017–18, the number of unregistered Rohingyas, mainly living in
south-eastern Bangladesh, was estimated at 350,000.98 In addition,
around 32,000 Rohingyas are officially recognized as refugees by
the GoB, who live in two official camps—Kutupalong in Ukhia and
Nayapara in Teknaf 99—under the supervision of the UNHCR and with
the help of many NGOs. Two makeshift camps—Taal in Ukhia and
Leda in Teknaf—accommodate about 80,000 unregistered Rohingyas.
So, before the arrival of over 750,000 new asylum seekers started on 25
August 2017, Bangladesh was already hosting about 500,000–550,000
Rohingyas. If we consider this as an official record, it could be assumed
that currently about 1,300,000 Rohingyas are living in Bangladesh in
permanent camps, makeshift camps, and temporarily built camps.
After the new arrivals in 2017, 32 temporary refugee camps have been
newly built in Ukhia and Teknaf (see Figure 2.2).
Unlike registered ones, unregistered Rohingyas are forced to lead an
inhuman life, since they are illegal residents with no status. They are
largely unemployed and vulnerable to ill health, random exploitation,
and mental and physical abuse. They do not even enjoy the basic and
minimum standard of life unlike the registered refugees in the UNHCR
camps. The UNHCR is mandated to protect refugees worldwide, but
48 The Rohingya

Figure 2.2 Newly built Rohingya refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar

Source: Author’s personal collection.

makes no significant protest against the injustices committed against

the unregistered Rohingyas. Even national media and civil society actors
in Bangladesh have been reluctant to raise the Rohingya issue. Local
people do not entertain the presence of the Rohingyas cordially, since
the local communities of Ukhia and Teknaf who hosted the unregis-
tered Rohingyas during the initial stages are themselves overcrowded
and resource-poor.100
Consequently, thousands of self-settled Rohingyas are perceived as
a burden and competitors for the already scant resources. Their vulner-
able position makes them an easy punching bag for unscrupulous local
politicians wishing to score political points.101 They are treated by both
locals and state institutions—civil administration, law enforcement
agencies, and local government bodies—as illegal migrants, unwelcome
outsiders, and socially disordered settlers. This book tells the story of
the Rohingyas in Bangladesh and details their treatment and lack of
access to basic rights, all of which are contrary to the internationally
endorsed law of human rights and the individual right to citizenship.
Though the Rohingyas do not legally exist in the state structure of
Bangladesh or Myanmar, they experience persecution and atrocities
committed by the state, which is a violation of human rights.102 This
book examines the ways in which the state becomes instrumental in
the lives of the Rohingyas and controls them as non-citizens through
what Michel Foucault called ‘bio-politics’103 and Elizabeth Povinelli
calls ‘geontologies’.104 Building on empirical evidence, the book argues
that the state does not legally attach to the non-citizens, but it is not
 Who Are the Rohingya? 49

operationally detached from them to reconfirm their non-citizenship,

which causes serious human rights violation.

***

Proper understanding of the past is important to better understand the

present conditions, and a critical assessment of the present is essential
to predict the future. The current situation of the Rohingyas was not cre-
ated overnight, but has been in the making as a result of the framework
of nation building and state formation in Burma, which started from
1962. Gradually, the state has executed its policy of exclusion, making
the Rohingyas politically, ethnically, and socially vulnerable, and taking
their citizenship away to render them stateless. Then, the state initiated
a particular project to drive them out of the country, which is described
in many academic and legal terms like ‘ethnic conflict’, ‘ethnic cleans-
ing’, and ‘genocide’.
In the light of this discussion, it is quite clear that military establish-
ment, political elites, ethnic extremists, and Buddhist fundamentalists
collectively constitute a combined force to execute the state’s policy of
driving the Rohingyas out of the country, which has created atrocious
living conditions for the Rohingyas in Rakhine State. This chapter has
attempted to provide a historical ground and foundation of Rohingya
ethnicity, history, and political landscape so that the chapters that
follow can build upon it. These chapters have ample ethnographic
narratives reflecting the current state of the Rohingyas both in Bangladesh
and Myanmar.

Notes
1. Apart from Ukhia and Teknaf in Cox’s Bazar, I interviewed many Rohingyas
in Chittagong, Dhaka, Kolkata, Delhi, and Assam. I also interviewed Rohingyas
living in London, United Kingdom (2009, 2014); Kitchenware of Waterloo,
Canada (2012); Heidelberg, Germany (2013); Wisconsin, United States of
America (2015); Toronto, Canada (2017); and Penang, Malaysia (2019).
2. The Rohingyas call themselves Rooinga, though English-speaking people
call them Rohingya. It has a strong historical background that I have discussed
in the later sections of this chapter. Also, for details, see Nasir Uddin, Not
Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle for Existence (in Bengali)
(Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b).
50 The Rohingya

3. Rooinga jatee means Rohingya nations.

4. Barth, in his seminal theory of ‘ethnic boundary’, has discussed that two
different ethnic groups become distinct in association with each other and
thereby one recognizes another as distinct from itself. See Fredrik Barth, ed.,
Ethnic Groups and Boundaries (USA: Little, Brown and Company, 1969).
5. Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries.
6. See Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries; T. Hylland Eriksen, Ethnicity and
Nationalism: Anthropological Perspectives (London: Pluto Press, 2002); Richard
Jenkins, Rethinking Ethnicity: Arguments and Explorations (Los Angeles, Delhi,
London, and Singapore: SAGE Publications, 2008); Andreas Wimmer, ‘The
Making and Unmaking of Ethnic Boundaries: A Multilevel Process Theory,’
American Journal of Sociology 113, no. 4 (2008): 970–1022.
7. Myanmar adopted the ‘Myanmar Citizenship Law’ in 1982, which
conferred citizenship to 135 national races, excluding the Rohingyas. Since
then, the Rohingyas are not recognized as citizens of Myanmar. See ‘Myanmar
Citizenship Law’, accessed 6 August 2018, http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/
Citizenship%20Law.htm.
8. See K. Fahmida Farzana, Memories of Burmese Rohingya Refugees: Contested
Identities and Belonging (London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2017).
9. Abdul Karim, The Rohingyas: A Short Account of Their History and Culture
(Chittagong: Arakan Historical Society, 2016), 23.
10. See M. Ali Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations (Kolkata: Firma KLM
Private Limited, 2004).
11. Mohibullah Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How? Origin and
Development of Rohingyas in Arakan,’ in To Host or To Hurt: Counter Narratives
on the Rohingya Refugee Issues in Bangladesh, ed. Nasir Uddin (Dhaka: The
Institute of Culture and Development Research, 2012), 16.
12. Michael W. Charney, ‘Where Jambudipa and Islamdom Converged:
Religious Change and the Emergence of Buddhist Communalism in Early
Modern Arakan (Fifteenth to Nineteenth Centuries’ (PhD dissertation,
Department of History, University of Michigan, 1999); Azeem Ibrahim, The
Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide (London: Hurst & Company,
2016); Iftekhar Iqbal, ‘Locating the Rohingya in Time and Space’, In the
Shadow of Violence, Daily Star (Star Weekend), 13 October 2017. Accessed 28
March 2020. https://www.thedailystar.net/star-weekend/the-shadow-violence/
locating-the-rohingya-time-and-space-1475248; Karim, The Rohingyas; A.P.
Phayre, History of Burma including Burma People, Pegu, Taungu, Tenasserim, and
Arakan (Ludgate Hill, London: Trubner & Co., 1883); G.E. Harvey, History of
Burma: From the Earliest Time to the 10 March, the Beginning of the English Conquest
(New Delhi and Madras: Asian Education Services, [1925] 2000); Siddiquee,
‘Who Are Rohingyas and How,’ 15–28.
 Who Are the Rohingya? 51

13. Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How,’ 15–16.

14. A. Mohammad Alam, A Short Historical Background of Arakan (Chittagong:
Arakan Historical Society, 1999), 5, accessed 2 February 2018, https://www.
kaladanpress.org/images/document/2018/A%20Short%20Historical%20
Background%20%20of%20Arakan.pdf.
15. See Phayre, History of Burma including Burma People, Pegu, Taungu,
Tenasserim, and Arakan; Harvey, History of Burma.
16. See Amanullah, ‘The Etymology of Arakan,’ The Arakan 10, no. 2 (1997):
4; Alam, A Short Historical Background of Arakan, 21.
17. Abid Bahar, ‘The Dynamics of Ethnic Relations in Burmese Society:
A Case Study of Ethnic Relations between the Burmese and the Rohingyas’
(Unpublished PhD dissertation, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada, 1982).
18. Cited in Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How,’ 16.
19. Phayre, History of Burma including Burma People, Pegu, Taungu, Tenasserim,
and Arakan; Harvey, History of Burma; Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How,’
15–28; Karim, The Rohingyas; Iqbal, ‘Locating the Rohingya in Time and Space’.
20. Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How,’ 16.
21. Alam, A Short Historical Background of Arakan, 26.
22. See, for example, Jacque P. Leider, ‘Rohingya: The History of a Muslim
Identity in Myanmar,’ in The Oxford Encyclopaedia of Asian History, eds. D. Ludden
et al. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018).
23. Burma became Myanmar in 1989.
24. For example, Aye Chan, ‘The Development of a Muslim Enclave in
Arakan (Rakhine) State of Burma (Myanmar),’ SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research
3, no. 2 (2005): 396–420; Anthony Ware and Constas Laoutides, Myanmar’s
‘Rohingya’ Conflict (London: Hurst & Company, 2018).
25. For example, Jacque P. Leider, ‘Rohingya: The Name, the Movement,
the Quest for Identity,’ in Nation Building in Myanmar, ed. Myanmar EGRESS
(Myanmar: Myanmar Peace Center, 2013), 204–55; Jacque P. Leider, ‘Competing
Identities and the Hybridized History of the Rohingyas,’ in Metamorphosis: Studies
in Social and Political Change in Myanmar, ed. Renaud Egreteau and Francois
Robinne (Singapore: NUS Press, 2015), 151–78. Here, it may be mentioned that
when Oxford University Press’s Oxford Research Encyclopedias (ORE) Asian
History series commissioned Dr Jacques Leider, head of the Bangkok-based
Ecole Française d’Extrême-Orient (EFEO) and a well-known advisor to the
Myanmar military’s Armed Forces Historical Museum in Naypyidaw, to write a
reference article on the subject of the Rohingyas for their forthcoming series, the
ORE Asian History (under ‘Political’, see ‘Rohingya: Emergence and Vicissitudes
of a Communal Muslim Identity in Myanmar’), this sparked a huge protest
from internationally acclaimed writers, scholars, academicians, and public
intellectuals, including Noam Chomsky and Gayatri Spivak. See the statement
52 The Rohingya

of protest at ‘Oxford U. Press, Myanmar Genocide & Its Choice of Dr Leider as

the Expert on Rohingyas,’ Change.Org, accessed 27 March 2018, https://www.
change.org/p/vice-chancellor-of-oxford-university-re-oxford-u-press-myanmar-
genocide-its-choice-of-dr-leider-as-the-expert-on-rohingyas.
26. For example, Khin Maung Saw, Islamization of Burma through Chittagonian
Bengalis as Rohingya Refugees (2001), accessed 10 November 2017, http://www.
burmalibrary.org/docs21/Khin-Maung-Saw-NM-2011-09-Islamanisation_of_
Burma_through_Chittagonian_Bengalis-en.pdf.
27. Karbala is a famous war in the history of Islam that took place in 680 CE.
Karbala is widely known as one of the heart-touching tragedies in Islamic
history. For details, see ‘Battle of Karbala,’ Britannica, accessed 20 March 2018,
https://www.britannica.com/event/Battle-of-Karbala.
28. Karim, The Rohingyas; Mahfuzur Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan
(in Bengali) (Chittagong-Dhaka: Bangladesh Co-operative Society, 2013);
Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’.
29. Alam, A Short Historical Background of Arakan, 8.
30. See Abuˉ al-Faz.l Ezzati, The Spread of Islam: The Contributing Factors
(London: Islamic College for Advanced Studies Press, 2002), 482; Siddiquee,
‘Who Are Rohingyas and How,’ 19–20; Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan,
34–5.
31. Karim, The Rohingyas; Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan; Siddiquee,
‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’.
32. Shah Barid Khan was a medieval narrative poet. He wrote three narra-
tive-poetry books: Vidyasundar, Rasul Bijay, and Hanifa-Kayrapari. For details, see
‘Shah Barid Khan’, Banglapedia, accessed 20 March 2018, http://en.banglapedia.
org/index.php?title=Shah_Barid_Khan.
33. Karim, The Rohingyas; Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan; Siddiquee,
‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’; Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations.
34. Karim, The Rohingyas; Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan; Siddiquee,
‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’.
35. For details, see Karim, The Rohingyas; Akhanda, History of Muslims in
Arakan; Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’.
36. Cited in Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations, 26.
37. See B. Bhattacharya, ‘Bengal Influence in Arakan, Bengal Past and
Present,’ Journal of the Calcutta Historical Society 33, no. 65–6 (1927): 139–44.
38. For details, see Phayre, History of Burma including Burma People, Pegu,
Taungu, Tenasserim, and Arakan, 78; Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations, 53–5;
Richard Forster, ‘Magh Marauders, Portuguese Pirates, White Elephants and
Persian Poets: Arakan and Its Bay-of-Bengal Connectivities in the Early Modern
Era,’ Explorations 11, no. 1 (2011): 64; Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’,
21; Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan, 38–9; Delwar Hossain, ‘Tracing
 Who Are the Rohingya? 53

the Plight of the Rohingyas,’ in The Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas, ed. Imtiaz
Ahmed (Dhaka: The University Press Limited, [2010] 2014), 14; Karim, The
Rohingyas, 24–5; Iqbal, ‘Locating the Rohingya in Time and Space,’ 4; Alamgir
Serajuddin, ‘Muslim Influence in Arakan and the Muslim Names of Arakanese
Kings: A Resentment,’ Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh 31, no. 1 (1986):
17–23; Ahmed Jilani, The Rohingyas of Arakan: Their Quest for Justice (Dhaka:
The University Press Limited, 1999); Bhattacharya, ‘Bengal Influence in Arakan,
Bengal Past and Present,’ 141.
39. Nasir Uddin, ‘Life in Everyday Death: Rohingyas in Bangladesh and
Myanmar,’ Berkeley Forum, Georgetown University, 19 October 2017a, accessed
22 October 2017, https://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/forum/religion-and-
the-persecution-of-rohingya-muslims/responses/life-in-everyday-death-the-
rohingyas-in-bangladesh-and-myanmar.
40. Karim, The Rohingyas; Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan; Siddiquee,
‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’; Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations; Hossain,
‘Tracing the Plight of the Rohingyas’; Jilani, The Rohingyas of Arakan; Bhattacharya,
‘Bengal Influence in Arakan, Bengal Past and Present’.
41. See Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan, 42.
42. Karim, The Rohingyas, 79–80.
43. See Phayre, History of Burma including Burma People, Pegu, Taungu,
Tenasserim, and Arakan, 78; Harvey, History of Burma, 95; Chowdhury, Bengal-
Arakan Relations, 128–32; Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’, 26–7;
Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan, 43; Hossain, ‘Tracing the Plight of the
Rohingyas,’ 14; Karim, The Rohingya, 41–4.
44. Farzana, Memories of Burmese Rohingya Refugees.
45. See Richard M. Eaton, The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204-
1760 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993); Ezzati, The Spread of Islam;
Akhanda, History of Muslims in Arakan; Keith Leitich, Decoding the Past: The
Rohingya Origin Enigma (Paper presented at the Third Annual Southeast Asian
Studies Symposium, Keble College, University of Oxford, 22–23 April 2014);
Karim, The Rohingyas.
46. See Phayre, History of Burma including Burma People, Pegu, Taungu,
Tenasserim, and Arakan; Francis Buchanan, ‘A Comparative Vocabulary of
Some of the Languages Spoken in the Burma Empire,’ Asiatic Researches 5:
219–40; Harvey, History of Burma; Charney, ‘Where Jambudipa and Islamdom
Converged’.
47. See Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga, 32.
48. Habib Siddiqui, The Forgotten Rohingya: Their Struggle for Human Rights
in Burma, Kindle Edition (Japan, 2007); Chowdhury, Bengal-Arakan Relations;
Siddiquee, ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How’; Akhanda, History of Muslims in
Arakan; Karim, The Rohingyas; Iqbal, ‘Locating the Rohingya in Time and Space’.
54 The Rohingya

49. Siddiqui, The Forgotten Rohingya; Bahar, ‘The Dynamics of Ethnic

Relations in Burmese Society’; Mohammed Yunus, A History of Arakan: Past and
Present (Chittagong: Magenta Colour, 1994); Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga.
50. Ezzati, The Spread of Islam; Maung Zarni and Alice Cowley, ‘Slow-
Burning Genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingyas,’ Pacific Rim Law & Policy Journal 23,
no. 3 (2014): 683–754; Ibrahim, The Rohingyas; Farzana, Memories of Burmese
Rohingya Refugees.
51. Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga, 37.
52. See Robert Wald Sussman, The Myth of Race: The Troubling and Persistence
of an Unscientific Idea (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2014); Alain F.
Corcos, Three Biological Myths: Race, Ancestry, Ethnicity (USA: Wheatmark, 2018).
53. See, for example, Ibrahim, The Rohingyas.
54. Buchanan, ‘A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages Spoken
in the Burma Empire,’ 55.
55. Also see, Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga.
56. The Classical Journal of 1811, accessed 7 November 2017, https://archive.
org/details/in. ernet.dli.2015.20962.
57. See for detail, Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga, 33.
58. For example, Charney, ‘Where Jambudipa and Islamdom Converged’;
Ibrahim, The Rohingyas; Farzana, Memories of Burmese Rohingya Refugees.
59. I found this book in the British Library and my German friend, Julia
Zimpel based in Berlin, translated it into English for me in 2018.
60. Cited in Ibrahim, The Rohingyas, 25. Please also see for details, J.S. Vater,
ed., Examples of German Vernaculars: Dr. Seetzen’s Linguistic Legacy and Other
Linguistic Research and Collections, In Particular on East India, trans. Julia Zimpel
(Leipzig: Gerhard Fleischer, the Disciple, 1816).
61. W. Hamilton, Geographical, Statistical, and Historical Description of
Hindostan and Its Adjacent Countries (Albemarle Street, London: John Murray,
1820).
62. Hamilton, Geographical, Statistical, and Historical Description of Hindostan
and Its Adjacent Countries, 802.
63. Nasir Uddin, ‘Ethnic Cleansing of the Rohingya People,’ in The Palgrave
Handbook of Ethnicity, ed. S. Ratuva (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019a).
64. Nasir Uddin, The Voices of the Victims: The ‘Subhuman’ life of the Rohingya
(An unpublished research monograph on the Rohingya Victims of 2017 cam-
paign in Rakhine State, 2019d).
65. Ibrahim, The Rohingyas, 25.
66. See Nasir Uddin, Eva Gerharz, and Pradeep Chakkarath, ‘Exploring
Indigeneity: Introductory Remarks on a Contested Concept,’ in Indigeneity on the
Move: Varying Manifestations of a Contested Concept, eds. Nasir Uddin, Eva Gerharz,
and Pradeep Chakkarath (Oxford and New York: Berghahn, 2018), 1–25.
 Who Are the Rohingya? 55

67. See Lola Romanucci-Ross, George A De Vose, and Takeyuki Tsuda,

eds., Ethnic Identity: Problems and Prospects for the Twenty-First Century (Lanham,
New York, Toronto and Oxford: Altamira Press, 2006); Eriksen, Ethnicity and
Nationalism; Marcus Banks, Ethnicity: Anthropological Constructions (London and
New York: Routledge, 1996).
68. See Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries; Barth, ‘Models of Social
Organizations’.
69. See the ‘United Nations Declaration for the Rights of Indigenous People’,
United Nations, accessed 30 March 2019, https://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/
documents/DRIPS_en.pdf.
70. See Nasir Uddin, ‘The Local Translation of Global Indigeneity: A Case of
the Chittagong Hill Tracts,’ Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 50, no. 1 (2019b):
68–85.
71. Particularly, Article 107 in the ILO Convention 1957 and Article 169 in
the ILO Convention 1989 confirmed the definition of indigenous people across
the world.
72. See, for details, André Béteille, ‘The Idea of Indigenous People,’
Current Anthropology 39, no. 2 (1998): 187–92; Justin Kenrick and Jerome
Lewis, ‘Indigenous Peoples’ Rights and the Politics of the Term “Indigenous”,’
Anthropology Today 20, no. 2 (2004): 4–9; James Clifford, Returns: Becoming
Indigenous in the Twenty-First Century (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,
2013); Uddin, Gerharz, and Chakkarath, ‘Exploring Indigeneity: Introductory
Remarks on a Contested Concept’.
73. See Nasir Uddin, Commonsense of Scholarship: Indigenous People,
Chittagong Hill Tracts and the Politics of Representation (in Bengali) (Dhaka: The
Institute of Culture and Development Research, 2016).
74. See Clifford, Returns; Uddin, Commonsense of Scholarship.
75. See Mary P. Callahan, Political Authority in Burma’s Ethnic Minority States:
Devolution, Occupation and Coexistence (Washington, DC: East-West Center,
2007); Michael W. Charney, A History of Modern Burma (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2009); Robert H. Taylor, The State in Myanmar (Singapore: The
Singapore National University Press, 2009).
76. See Uddin, Gerharz, and Chakkarath, ‘Exploring Indigeneity:
Introductory Remarks on a Contested Concept’.
77. Nel Vandekerckhove, ‘“We Are Sons of this Soil”: The Endless Battle
Over Indigenous Homelands in Assam, India,’ Critical Asian Studies 41, no. 4
(2009): 523–48.
78. See Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga.
79. Vandekerckhove, ‘“We Are Sons of this Soil”’.
80. See Chan, ‘The Development of a Muslim Enclave in Arakan (Rakhine)
State of Burma (Myanmar)’; Leider, ‘Rohingya: The Name, the Movement, the
56 The Rohingya

Quest for Identity’; Leider, ‘Competing Identities and the Hybridized History of
the Rohingyas’.
81. See, for details, Chan, ‘The Development of a Muslim Enclave in
Arakan (Rakhine) State of Burma (Myanmar)’; Leider, ‘Rohingya: The Name,
the Movement, the Quest for Identity’; Leider, ‘Competing Identities and the
Hybridized History of the Rohingyas’.
82. See Chan, ‘The Development of a Muslim Enclave in Arakan (Rakhine)
State of Burma (Myanmar),’ 412.
83. See David Brown, The State and Ethnic Politics in SouthEast Asia (London
and New York: Routledge, 1996), 31.
84. See, Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga; Zarni and Cowley, ‘Slow-
Burning Genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingyas’; Siddiqui, The Forgotten Rohingya;
Jilani, The Rohingyas of Arakan; Bahar, ‘The Dynamics of Ethnic Relations in
Burmese Society’.
85. The name ‘Burma’ was changed to ‘Myanmar’, and ‘Arakan’ to ‘Rakhine
State’, by the military government in 1989.
86. Agence France-Presse (AFP), Myanmar, [and] Bangladesh Leaders 'to
Discuss Rohingya' (Paris: Agence France-Presse, 25 June 2012).
87. Imtiaz Ahmed, ‘State and Stateless in South Asia: Reaping Benefits from
a Reconstructed Discourse on State and Nationality,’ Theoretical Perspective 9 &
10 (2002–3): 05.
88. For details, see Harvey, History of Burma; Karim, The Rohingyas; Médecins
Sans Frontiers, 10 Years for the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Past, Present and
Future (Médecins Sans Frontiers, 2002); Nasir Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting:
Crises in Co-existence with Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’ in To Host or To
Hurt: Counter-Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh, ed. Nasir Uddin
(Dhaka: Institute of Culture and Development Research, 2012a), 83–98.
89. The people of Rakhine State, believed to be a mixture of an indigenous
Hindu group and the Mongols, have inhabited Arakan since early historical
times. Today, the Rakhine are Buddhists, speak a dialect of Burmese, and consti-
tute the majority ethnic group in Rakhine State.
90. Karim, The Rohingyas.
91. Médecins Sans Frontiers, 10 Years for the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh.
92. Burma was renamed as Myanmar in 1989. Hence, when discussing
events/occurrences that took place before 1989, I will call the country Burma,
and when discussing events that took place after 1989, I will call it Myanmar.
Why Burma became Myanmar is also a matter of great historical, political, and
reformist debate, which I will discuss in one of the later chapters.
93. Ibrahim, The Rohingyas, 48.
94. Chris Lewa, Unregistered Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Crackdown,
Forced Displacement and Hunger (Bangkok: The Arakan Project, 2010).
 Who Are the Rohingya? 57

95. Scott Mathieson, ‘Plight of the Damned: Burma’s Rohingya,’ Global Asia
4, no. 1 (2009): 87.
96. The Rohingya speak in Chittagonian language, a dialect of Bengali lan-
guage, and the people living in Chittagong region speak in the same language.
97. Tarek Mahmud, ‘Over One Million Rohingyas get Biometric
Registration,’ Dhaka Tribune, 18 January 2018, accessed 20 March 2018, http://
www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2018/01/18/one-million-rohingyas-
get-biometric-registration/.
98. This is an estimated number of unregistered Rohingyas, since there is no
official record. The actual number of unregistered Rohingyas would be much
larger than the estimate, as the flow of migration has continued.
99. Ukhia and Teknaf are two sub-districts of Cox’s Bazar district.
100. Nasir Uddin, ‘State of Stateless People: The Plight of Rohingya Refugees
in Bangladesh,’ in Human Rights to Citizens: A Slippery Concept, ed. Rhoda Howard
-Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts (USA: The University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015), 65.
101. Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting: Crises in Co-existence with Rohingya
Refugees in Bangladesh’.
102. Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Alison Kesby, The Right to
Have Rights: Citizenships, Humanity and International Law (Oxford: The Oxford
University Press, 2012); Emma Larking, Refugees and the Myth of Human Rights:
Life outside the Pale of the Law (London and New York: Routledge, 2014).
103. See Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Volume 1 (Boston, MA:
Vantage Books, 1976).
104. By theory of ‘Geontologies’, Elizabeth Povinelli talks about the mecha-
nism of power that makes a distinction between ‘lives’ and ‘non-lives’, where
‘non-lives’ are dealt with differently unlike the ‘lives’. The Rohingyas are appar-
ently non-lives and therefore dealt with accordingly from the statist perspective.
For details, see Elizabeth Povinelli, Geontologies: A Requiem to Late Liberalism
(Durham: Duke University Press, 2016).
 Of Hurting and Hosting
3 The Rohingyas in the Place of Migration

T his chapter discusses the crises of social integration of Rohingya

refugees in the host societies of south-eastern Bangladesh in the
context of Ukhia and Teknaf, which are currently hosting more than
one million Rohingyas.1 Many media reports have indicated that the
influx of Rohingyas, both old and new arrivals, has been so large that
the local Bengalis have become a demographic minority in their respec-
tive localities.2 Therefore, the social integration for the Rohingyas in
Ukhia and Teknaf has become critical and complex, though not violent
and hostile yet.3 This chapter attempts to understand the dynamics
of social interaction between the host societies and the refugees in an
attempt to comprehend the crises of social integration. It is to be noted
here that the scenario of integrations presents the situation before the
latest, and the biggest, influx started on 25 August 2017. Therefore, the
information and experience contextualized here are based on my long
years of fieldwork intermittently spanning from 2001 to 2019, in two
villages, Pasan Para (Ukhia) and Vasan Para (Teknaf). Already taking
different shapes between local Bengalis and Rohingya refugees, condi-
tions have seemingly worsened because new arrivals have added newer
dimensions4 to pre-existing ones.
Hosting refugees is always problematic as seen by the host society,
whereas the refugees perceive this tension as ‘hurting’. Gil Loescher and
James Milner discussed the protracted refugee situation, detailing the
crisis of social integration where refugees consider anything undesirable
The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
 Of Hurting and Hosting 59

as ‘hurting’ by the host society.5 They explained that the long-term pres-
ence of refugee populations has come to be seen by many host states
as a source of insecurity. Consequently, host states have taken various
essential measures, including keeping refugees in isolated and insecure
camps, preventing new arrivals, and, in extreme cases, executing forc-
ible repatriation.6 In fact, state-level perception and local-level reality
are different at the level of principles and the actual reality of hosting
refugees, as Alison Mountz explained in her book, Seeking Asylum, in
the context of Canada, the United States of America, and Australia.7
What the state thinks of as ‘right-doing’—from the top all the way to
the smallest unit of society—might appear as ‘wrong-doing’ to those
at the bottom of society. It is at the local level that society encounters
problems that the top-down implementation of a policy may lead to.
Everyday issues are borne more directly and explicitly at the bottom
ranks than at the level of state institutions.8 This chapter focuses on
the dynamics of interaction, contestation, and conflict between the
host society and migrated refugees at the grass-root level through the
metaphorical registers of ‘hosting’ and ‘hurting’. Operationally speak-
ing, by ‘hosting’, I mean the ways and processes in which migrants and
refugees are dealt with in the host society; and by ‘hurting’, I mean the
ways in which migrants and refugees receive the responses that contrast
with their aspirations, expectations, and desires from the host society.
Though hosting and hurting are perceived from subjective standpoints,
the chapter attempts to unveil the relative objective reality in the con-
text of the predicament of integration between refugees and the host
society in the case of the Rohingyas9 in Bangladesh.
Experience and history say that hosting the refugee is always hurtful,
particularly when the host itself is a resource-poor and overpopulated
country like Bangladesh.10 This is not only applicable to Bangladesh,
but also to many other countries. Scholars11 are of the opinion that
neighbouring states, for emergency cases, often provide refugees with
temporary shelter, but for the host society, at the local level, warm
reception is not the most obvious of responses. The state, in this case,
follows the foreign policy of ‘fraternity’ with neighbouring states and
‘friendship to all, enemy to none’12 policy, but the local-level experi-
ences are different and contested. With the demographic composition
of the local community changing, at the behest of the state, the pres-
sure on local social and economic resources and facilities also increases
60 The Rohingya

manifold. The state often overlooks the aid, extra resource allocation,
and additional development focus it ought to provide to make up for
the excess influx while rehabilitating the refugee population. Without
the availability of adequate aid, additional support, added services, and
additional resource allocation, the host community continues to be in
conflict with the refugee community, and thereby the suffering on both
sides. In the case of Rohingya refugees, ‘initially local people provided
shelter to refugees on [the] grounds of humanity when they first started
coming in 1978 and 1991/1992, but the sentiment comes in crisis when
existing adversities meet the presence of additional people, hampering
the everyday course of life of the host society.’13 When interpersonal
relations become critical and the host community’s acceptance of the
incoming refugees starts reducing, refugees consider it as ‘hurting’. They
blame the hosts for hurting them, which is represented as a question
of violation of human rights by the international organizations and
local rights bodies.14 In fact, the locals of the host society quite often
exploit the helplessness and vulnerable conditions of refugees, which is
also left unaddressed in state-level readings of refugee problems.15 The
grassroot-level veracity of hosting and hurting refugees gets little space
in top-down interpretations of refugee issues where the local-societal
reality remains untapped. This chapter argues that the question of host-
ing and hurting depends on the quandary of integration of refugees in
the host society. The state and non-state agencies are critical in framing
the structure of relations between the refugees and the host society. This
structure is generally ignored in the analysis of the crises of integration
of the refugees. The chapter addresses these issues with ethnographic
details in the present context, that of the Rohingya refugees living in the
south-eastern region, Teknaf and Ukhia of Bangladesh. They have been
living in this region for decades as both registered and unregistered
refugees.

Discourse of ‘Hosting’ and ‘Hurting’

Of the many cases I have recorded that are good enough to represent a
comprehensive scenario of ‘hosting’ and ‘hurting’ between the Rohingya
refugees and the local Bengalis, let us begin the discussion with a case of
elopement. As a means to getting married, this act is seen as disobedience
to family, guardians, and the existing social system in rural Bangladesh.16
 Of Hurting and Hosting 61

Though the number of marriages by elopement are significantly higher

in urban Bangladesh and the rates are growing, such incidents still face
social stigma and, thereby, are not well-received by both families and
the community.17 We see that individual freedom of choice comes in
conflict with community expectations, long-standing traditions, and the
society’s desire for marriage to take place with prior consent, approval,
and social sanction of families and guardians. Marriage in the traditional
sense is a binding ritual between families, lineages, and communities,
and not merely between two individuals; this is still the dominant cul-
ture in Bangladesh.18 Besides, marriage through elopement is still very
much unwelcome from a religious perspective in rural Muslim families
in Bangladesh because the idea of ‘holy’ is still socially and cultural
constructed in Bangladesh; Elora Shehabuddin discussed this in detail
in her ethnography on rural Bangladesh.19 Both in urban and rural
Bangladesh, marriages that receive social sanction are still the ones that
are endogamous, they are based on family and community’s approval.
Therefore, marriage is not a social institution formed by the choice of
two individuals, but a huge engagement and an active involvement of
two families, and also two samajs,20 to some extent.
In case of a Rohingya as spouse, family acceptance and social rec-
ognition are different because of the social discourse of honour and
shame attributed to a refugee, particularly Rohingya refugees. In 2011,
when I was doing fieldwork in Pasan Para, I recorded a case of an
elopement that unveiled how the notion of social prestige is related
to affinal relation with a Rohingya in Ukhia and Teknaf. When Jashim
(27),21 a local Bengali man, married Rohima (22), a Rohingya refugee
girl, and brought his new bride home, Jashim’s father, Makbul (50),
was very shocked and disappointed. Jashim is his only son who, as per
Bangladeshi customs, traditions and conventions, is expected to carry
ahead the legacy, continuity, and burden of bangsha22 or the lineage.
There was every reason for Makbul, as per local sentiment, family emo-
tion, and traditional rules of keeping the bangsha in continuity, to be
shocked by his only son’s ‘unwise’ deed. Makbul asked his son, ‘Why
have you done this disastrous act? I had cherished the desire to arrange
a big ceremony and hold a big party to celebrate your marriage in a
festive fashion, inviting all villagers, friends, and relatives. You have
spoilt my dreams, desires, honour, and prestige in the society. Your
stupid move has destroyed the future of my bangsha. In fact, our future
62 The Rohingya

generations will go through an identity crisis due to your marriage to

a Rohingya. Have you ever thought how I will continue my social and
affinal23 relations with a Rohingya family? How will I call your father-
in-law beyai24 and hug him congenially? How will I introduce your
father-in-law to my relatives, friends, and social mates as my beyai?
Where will I hide my face now?’ ‘I am sorry,’ Jashim replied to his father,
‘I had no other choice as I fell in love with her.’ Jashim tried to defend
his position in support of his elopement. He continued, ‘Father, all
Rohingyas are not the same. She is a very good girl. Father, I love a
human being, not a Rohingya and not a refugee. Since I knew that you
would never accept a Rohingya woman as your daughter-in-law, finding
no other alternative, I had to elope with her.’ When this exchange was
going on between father and son, I was present there along with some
other close relatives and next-door neighbours. The conversation ended
with some heated words when Makbul said, ‘Leave my house and get
out … do not show your face to me anymore as you have destroyed
my honour and prestige in the society.’ Jashim also responded, ‘If you
cannot show minimum respect for my emotions and decisions, if you
cannot accept my wife, I cannot leave my wife and, hence, cannot stay
here anymore.’ This conversation between father and son reveals the
social context and the place of the Rohingyas in Bangladesh, where
affinal relations with Rohingyas are considered as a ‘damage to social
image’ and a ‘task of social stigma’. It is widely believed that marital
association with a Rohingya jeopardizes the social status, social pres-
tige, generational continuity of a lineage, and the dignity of identity
for traditional Bangladeshis.25 This event reveals the dynamics of
acceptance and rejection—hosting and hurting—of Rohingya refugees
in the social fabric of Bangladesh. If we see a similar case from the
perspective of Rohingya refugees, it unfolds a different scenario. During
my fieldwork, I was following this event and wanted to know about
the progress in the relationship between Jashim and Rahima and their
relations with their respective families, if there were any. I found that
Jashim started living separately with Rahima. I interviewed Rahima and
her father. When I interviewed Rahima, she had, by the time, become a
mother of two sons. After four years, in 2014, Rahima explained to me:

Even today, my in-laws do not accept me as a member of their family. I

have become a citizen of Bangladesh as Jashim’s wife and have a voter
 Of Hurting and Hosting 63

identification card as a recognition of my citizenship, but my father-

in-law has not accepted me yet. They are even reluctant to accept my
two sons as their descendents and members of their lineage. Jashim has
maintained a kind of cold relation with his family since we married, but
my father-in-law has never visited us. Following our marriage, my parents
had to face a lot of criticism, humiliation, and mental torture in pub-
lic places time and again for committing ‘the crime of letting me marry
Makbul’s son, Jashim’. It happens not only in my life but also in the lives
of many other Rohingya girls, only because we are Rohingyas.

Rahima’s narrative is instrumental to understand the discourse of

‘hosting’ and ‘hurting’ because it reveals the cruel reality of Bengal-
Rohingya relations in Ukhia and Teknaf. Besides, Rahima’s story consti-
tutes the notion of ‘hurting’, since it happens in the lives of many other
Rohingyas.
On record, only 32,000 Rohingyas out of more than one million,
were officially registered and recognized as refugees by the GoB before
the latest influx in 2016 and 2017. They used to live in two official
camps—Kutupalong of Ukhia and Nayapara of Teknaf—under the
supervision of the UNHCR. Now, the question is, if only 32,000
Rohingyas live in official refugee camps, what about the others? The
rest of them—around one million who are officially unrecognized as
refugees, who are now under the biometric registration system as ‘forc-
ibly displaced Myanmar’s nationals’ (FDMN)—live in different villages,
makeshift refugee camps, and roadsides of the south-eastern region of
Bangladesh, though newly arrived Rohingyas are kept in 32 tempo-
rarily built refugee camps26 in Teknaf, Ukhia, and nearby places. The
remaining ‘Rohingyas have been struggling to survive in and around the
south-eastern part of Bangladesh, Teknaf and Ukhia, two sub-districts of
Cox’s Bazar for years’.27 During my recent visits in 2017, 2018, and 2019,
I witnessed the alarmingly excessive presence of the Rohingyas every-
where in Ukhia and Teknaf. Conversations with locals reveal a dramatic
change in the mindset of the local people and host society. Amidst my
decade-long academic engagement with the Rohingyas, I have observed
that unregistered Rohingyas—that is, those who are not registered as
newly arrived FDMN—are largely unemployed, vulnerable to ill health,
and subject to labour exploitation, whereas registered refugees are
supplied adequate food, have access to a basic healthcare system, and
have been provided with shelter by the UNHCR, which is assigned to
64 The Rohingya

take care of them. It is also reported that until the new influx started
in August 2017, UNHCR, local human rights organizations, and civil
society remained silent on the rights of Rohingya refugees who were
unregistered.28 Local people, on the other hand, do not entertain their
presence warmly for many reasons. I wrote elsewhere long ago that:

since Ukhia and Teknaf of Cox’s Bazar are an overcrowded and resource-
poor area, thousands of self-settled Rohingyas have been living in the
local community for years and hence they are largely perceived as a
burden on [the] already scant resources of the locality and a threat to
the local job market. They are treated by both the local people and state
institutions—civil administration, law enforcing agencies, local govern-
ment bodies and bureaucrats—as illegal-migrants, unwelcome outsiders
and socially disordered settlers.29

Destitute conditions have often driven some Rohingyas to petty

crimes, which usually leads to a lot of backlash from the Bangladeshi
hosts. The relationship between the host society and the Rohingya

Figure 3.1 Rohingyas are spreading over every corner of Ukhia and Teknaf on
a daily basis.
Source: Author’s personal collection.
 Of Hurting and Hosting 65

refugees had not been smooth for a long time and, since the latest
influx, it has turned into a bitter and complex one. The genocide30 that
displaced thousands of Rohingyas reveals new structural antagonisms
between the hosts in south-eastern Bangladesh and the refugees. It is
also be noted here that along with the tension between local Bengalis
and Rohingya refugees, I have noticed that a new kind of tension is
growing between Rohingya refugees who arrived earlier and the new
arrivals. One of the reasons for this, according to me, is that the new
arrivals are paid more attention and provided food, shelter, and daily
essentials unlike the old ones. I will discuss this in the following chap-
ters. Now, I will try to analyse this hurting and hosting phenomenon
through a few more instances given in this chapter.

Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh:

Contested Narratives
In most cases, the situation of refugees is explained from two con-
tested perspectives. One perspective is of the host society, which always
portrays refugees as being responsible for mountains of misdeeds and
boundless miseries, and for destabilizing their normal course of life.
Another perspective is that of Rohingya refugees, who always claim
that the host society often violates their rights as human beings and
is very unkind to them. Nell Gabiam, in the context of Palestinian
refugees in Syria,31 has explained that the host community can never
meet the demands of the refugees as their needs are endless, but the
refugees consider it as a denial of their entitlement. Based on her works
on three camps in Syria, Gabiam analyses that two kinds of tensions
work in the camps: politics of suffering, to keep alive the discourse
around the Palestinian right of return; and politics of citizenship, to
close the divide between the camp and the city.32 The divide remains
alive and this ‘divide’ between the camps and the city is similar to
what I metaphorically present as ‘hosting’ in the form of assisting
the refugee situation and ‘hurting’ in the form of how the refugees
look at the non-fulfillment of their expectation and desires.33 In the
context of the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, we find a similar
blame game between the two communities. Among the general pub-
lic in Bangladesh, and the policymakers, NGOs, and international
66 The Rohingya

organizations, there are two contrasting points of view that have

existed for long. One of the viewpoints (of the host community) states
that the Rohingya refugees are a big burden upon the local society
because they share the local facilities for their survival. Besides, they
are destroying the law and order situation of the host society by stealing
and committing robbery, damaging local ecology by cutting trees in the
forests, capturing employment opportunities by selling cheap labour
in the job market, and creating social instability by committing
various crimes.34 Another viewpoint (of the refugees) explicates
that the refugees are treated very inhumanly, exploited because of
their vulnerable social conditions, forced to provide cheap labour,
harassed sexually by the locals, tortured by security forces in violation
of human rights, and oppressed economically by intermediaries.35
Both contested theses, as my research finds, have a degree of relevance
and their own place—though sometimes grossly exaggerated by
both parties—which rather intensifies the crises of the integration of
refugees in the host society.
Before entering a detailed discussion on issues of contested notions
of reciprocal relations, I will cite two polarized narratives—one from
a local Bengali and another from a Rohingya refugee—based on my
experience of doing ethnographic fieldwork. During my fieldwork in
Pasan Para, I was staying with a Bengali family. During an interview,
conducted in 2012, Kamal Hossain (58), a local Bengali, explained to
me his relations with Rohingyas:
These Bormaya36 people, Rohingyas, have caused huge damage to our
lives. They have no culture. They have no social norms and values. They
do not know how to behave with the neighbours, elders, and the younger
ones. They frequently commit various social crimes including robbery,
stealing, and hijacking. They have destroyed the forests of the locality
by cutting and selling wood in the market as firewood. Besides, they
have created a serious unemployment problem by selling their labour
cheap in the local job market. The cases of elopement have alarmingly
increased since Rohingya boys and girls are exploiting local young boys
and girls in the name of love and romance. Moreover, they are creating
violence in connection with different local political wings patronized by
the Awami League (AL37) and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP38).
In fact, they are the real troublemakers and a threat to the local society
and social stability.
 Of Hurting and Hosting 67

This interview was recorded seven years ago, and it is quite under-
standable that over the years, the antagonistic strain reflected above has
become stronger. In fact, this interview serves as a sample indicating the
dominant attitude of locals towards the Rohingya refugees, particularly
towards the unregistered Rohingyas who are living in the 32 refugee
camps located in Ukhia and Teknaf of Cox’s Bazar. The narrative, from
a local Bengali’s viewpoint, emerges as one embedded in the every-
day experience of life in dealing with the Rohingyas. It also reveals
the local perception of Rohingya personhood, their culture, and their
unwelcome existence in the local settings. Conversely, the Rohingyas’
attitude towards the local Bengalis has been shaped by their everyday
struggle for survival, their living conditions, and the problems they face
in dealing with the host community. While visiting Vasan Para in 2012,
Mominul Islam (53), an unregistered Rohingya refugee, explained his
position to me:

We are often identified as illegal outsiders and, hence, are dealt with
inhumanly. We are often regarded as burdens in all respects since local
people think that we are capturing their meals. We cannot earn two meals
a day, and hence, starvation has become part of our everyday life. No
facilities—medical, educational, or residential—are provided to us as we
are not registered as refugees. No GOs, no NGOs, and no international
organizations like UNESCO or UNHCR provide us with any kind of
support for our survival since we are not officially recognized. We want to
be registered but the government declines to do so. The police treat us as
socially disordered [that is, criminals committing social crimes] people.
Local administrations treat us as illegal residents. Local people treat us
like animals. In fact, we are treated as subhumans. We, Rohingyas, are
not human beings.

This statement of a Rohingya shows how they are treated as subordi-

nates by the host society. They feel helpless and exploited because they
are denied recognition, legal rights, and entitlements. The statement
clearly explains how the local host society deals with Rohingya refu-
gees in Bangladesh. A testimony of the lived experience of a Rohingya
refugee, as stated earlier, is not a mere outburst of emotions of one
individual but reflects the dismal and inhuman plight of Rohingya
refugees in Bangladesh.
68 The Rohingya

Here, it should be made clear that the situation of the Rohingyas

in Bangladesh has improved a little, after the massive influx in 2017,
because several international and national NGOs came forward to sup-
port them. In the spectrum of supports, the old ones were also incor-
porated and hence their situations have improved along with the new
arrivals.
Despite contrasts, the two narratives provide us with a portrait of
the state of relations and the degree of mutual interaction between
Rohingya refugees and the local Bengalis. One view reveals how the
local people deal with a large number of refugees in their everyday
life, which is also instrumental in understanding the plight of the
Rohingyas in Bangladesh. On the other hand, another view reveals
how a large number of refugees, both registered and unregistered, lived
in abysmal conditions in Bangladesh, at least until the massive influx
of 2017.39 Considering both views, I will discuss the impediments to
the integration of the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh in two separate
sections: (1) Why, and on what grounds, had the local society accepted
the Rohingyas and sheltered them in their locality? and (2) why are
they rejecting them now? And why are the local Bengalis considering
the Rohingyas as an unwanted burden in their lives? This section also
narrates the kind of miseries the Rohingyas have been experiencing for
decades, which they consider as ‘hurting’.

Hosting the Guests: Why Did the Local Society Accept

the Rohingyas?
The relationship between the Rohingyas and the local Bengalis has
evolved over the years since the Rohingyas first migrated to this region.
‘What the situation in the beginning was did not last long and hence
relationship between Rohingyas and local people has become critical
with each passing day because of many conflicts of interest of classes
[sic].’40 Hossain said, ‘When Rohingya refugees came to Bangladesh
from Myanmar, the local people were sympathetic to them. They helped
them, providing clothes, food, and even shelter. Over the years, the
situation has changed. Now-a-days, the relationship between Rohingya
refugees and the community people [local people] are not warm. The
local[s] are becoming unhappy, if not hostile to the Rohingya refugees.’41
 Of Hurting and Hosting 69

Based on my long years of research engagement with the Rohingyas, I

found two basic reasons why local Bengalis of south-eastern Bangladesh
provided Rohingyas with shelter in their locality, while the Bangladeshi
state had a different political strategy and foreign policy.42 In the begin-
ning, in 1978, the Rohingyas were received warmly by the local people
of Cox’s Bazar mainly on (1) humanitarian grounds and (2) the feel-
ing of Muslim brotherhood. Many local Bengalis of Ukhia and Teknaf,
along with several villagers of Pasan Para and Vasan Para, time and
again, told me since 199743 that they felt that it was their duty to stand
beside the Rohingyas since they were oppressed, tortured, persecuted,
and inhumanly killed by the military junta of Myanmar and forced to
leave their homeland. Besides, they also felt that it was their duty as the
Rohingyas were also Muslims by religion. In fact, the local people of
Ukhia and Teknaf said: ‘As human beings, we felt it was our moral and
sacred duty to help other Muslim brothers and sisters in crisis’.
I spent a long time conversing with the older local Bengali infor-
mants who shared their experiences of interacting with the Rohingyas.
In most cases I found that local people, from the very beginning,
received the Rohingyas very warmly and entertained them as ‘genuine
guests’. Even in the beginning, in the late eighties, many locals made
room for migrant Rohingyas in their house and fed them for weeks and
months without expecting anything in return. Some local families pro-
vided many Rohingya families of five/six members each, with shelter
and food for weeks without any hesitation. Quite a few helped them
find shelter in and around their yards and facilitated jobs for them to
survive. This hospitality gradually started to fade. Badsha Mian (52), a
local Bengali, explained to me in 2012:

Everyone has a mother, father, sisters, and sons. Problems, on the other
hand, may come in everyone’s life. So, we should help each other in need
and crises. When we learnt that [the] Rohingyas were severely tortured,
killed, and forced to leave their country by the military junta and that
[the] Rohingyas, finding no other alternative, were crossing the nearby
border and coming in our land, we felt great sympathy for them and took
initiatives to provide them with shelter. Many families came with little
children, whereas several other families came with adult daughters. So, it
appeared to us as a question of humanity, crisis of humanity, and hence,
we gave them shelter on the grounds of humanity. We felt at that time
that it was our sacred duty to stand by them on humanitarian grounds
70 The Rohingya

and we did so. Had we not made room for them and had turned them
away, many of them would be forced to kill themselves as they could
not possibly go back to Burma. That was why we gave them shelter and
provided [them] food and other essentials.

Mohammad Ali, a local Bengali, the head of the household where I

used to stay during my fieldwork, still holds a similar sense of feeling
for the Rohingyas. He still thinks of the Rohingyas as a stateless people,
Muslims in crisis, who need help to survive. He also thinks that support-
ing and lending a helping hand to the Rohingyas in crisis is, as he has
said, ‘our moral and human duty as the[ir] closest neighbours’. Though
the Rohingya presence by the time had become a critical issue among
the locals of the host society due to, according to the majority of the
local Bengalis’ claims, many sorts of misconduct by the Rohingya refu-
gees, some like Ali still prefer to stand by the Rohingyas. In his words:

There are always two categories of people: good and bad. Some Rohingyas
are bad in their nature but not necessarily all Rohingyas. Besides, I some-
times think that they are victims of the situation. Bad times may come in
everyone’s life. We Bengalis did go through a similar experience in 1971
during the liberation war when one crore people took refuge in India
because it was a bad time for us. They are coming here just for the sake of
their survival. This is not their pleasure trip; [it is] out of a lack of choice,
they fled their homes, for the sake of their lives. We should try and think
of ourselves in their situation. We all know that necessity never knows the
law because poverty is the mother of all misdeeds.

This sort of solidarity, a feeling of empathy, as far as my experience

goes based on interactions with local Bengalis, is becoming more and
more scarce in Vasan Para and Pasan Para because most of the people
have had bitter experiences in dealing with Rohingya refugees. Besides,
the recent influx of Rohingyas has created a very critical situation,44
adding new dimensions to the dynamics of social integration, and has
drastically altered people’s perceptions. Nonetheless, I still find that
many local Bengalis have strong sympathetic feelings towards them,
guided by the sentiment of Muslim brotherhood and fraternity, as
mentioned earlier. One of my Bengali informants, Kamaluddin (49),
second cousin of my host Mohammad Ali, told me:

Muslims stand beside Muslims in crises. This is the basic lesson of Islam.
When we came to know that our Rohingya Muslim brothers45 were in
 Of Hurting and Hosting 71

crises, oppressed and inhumanly tortured by military junta and non-

Muslim Buddhists, we became worried for them. We thought of doing
something for them at that time. We learnt that Rohingya Muslim broth-
ers were crossing the border to take shelter in this region; we even went
forward to receive them since we felt it was our sacred duty to support
Muslims in crises. We provided them with shelter in and around our own
homeland. We tried our best to help them so that they could survive here
with their family members that included children, adult girls, and aged
parents. We did it out of our moral duty for our Muslim brothers and
sisters because the lesson of our holy book is that ‘Duniar Sokol Musalman
Vai Vai’, meaning all Muslims across the world are brothers [and sisters]
with each other.

During my stay in the field in different periods, I found that this rela-
tionship between the Rohingyas and Bengalis has transformed. Over
four decades, the congenial relationship has turned into something that
I have rhetorically termed as ‘hurting’. I discuss the reasons of ‘hurting’
in the next section because this section primarily presents the reasoning
and attitudes of the local Bengalis regarding ‘hosting’ Rohingyas.

Hurting the Guests: The Construct of the Ungrateful

Refugee, the Inhuman
Chittagonian46 people are widely known for their generosity and hos-
pitality. Nevertheless, the people of Teknaf and Ukhia are known to
all as hosts hurting their guests, the Rohingya refugees. Various reports
of Amnesty International, UNHCR, human rights groups, Médecins
Sans Frontières (MSF), and so on, have strongly made public that many
human rights violations have taken place in relation to the Rohingya
refugees.
My close observation of Rohingya migration and settlement in the
south-eastern part of Cox’s Bazar for more than two decades made me
understand that the feeling of Muslim brotherhood and deep sympathy
for the exploited and oppressed people in the neighbourhood began
to recede when the local people gradually found that Rohingyas were,
according to their term, ‘penetrating’ their daily course of life and creat-
ing problems that they had not anticipated. The local people slowly
observed that the Rohingyas were replacing them in the job market,
occupying their lands, destroying forests by cutting and selling firewood
72 The Rohingya

in the market, and getting involved in various social crimes and crimi-
nal activities, mainly stealing, hijacking, and robbery. According to
Makbul (57), a local Bengali, in 2012:

It is true that we now no longer want [the] Rohingyas to stay in our

land. Not only me, 99 per cent of local Bengalis are really fed up with
Rohingya refugees, their behaviour, and their presence in our locality.
Though we gave them shelter when they were in crises, in return they
gave us unbearable problems and intolerable sufferings. It is indeed not
our fault because their character is something like that; je thalate khai
shei thalate-i tara paikhana kore [they defecate in the same plate they eat
from]. Rohingya jat-tai emon je tara je kolshir pani khai, shei kolshi abar ghuta
dia futa kore dei. Okritoggo. [Rohingya is the name of typical nation that
make holes in the pitcher they drink from. They are a very ungrateful
nation.] So, we cannot tolerate them for long. In fact, we have already
done for them far more than our capacity [sic], but in return, they have
given [us] unbearable pain personally and socially. Rohingya people are
not manusher jaat [human race].

Makbul’s statement clearly reveals the unpleasant structure of rela-

tions between the local Bengalis and the Rohingya refugees living in
Ukhia and Teknaf. However, this reflects one side of the relation, the
Bengali perspective, but there is also a Rohingya perspective to this. On
14 October 2016, a ‘beating event’ over an allegation of snatching hap-
pened in Ukhia between some local Bengalis and a few Rohingya refu-
gees. Some Bengalis from Ukhia Cotbazar47 searched for a Rohingya,
Selim (28), and caught him in connection with a snatching that had
taken place in the morning at a nearby road. Selim denied any involve-
ment in the crime and said that he had been in Teknaf in the morn-
ing with his mother and had come back to Ukhia that afternoon. The
Bengalis present there were not ready to listen to anything and started
beating him brutally. By this time, a few more Rohingyas joined Selim
and gave evidence in support of his presence in Teknaf in the morn-
ing. The Bengalis present there, rather than listening to them, started
beating them as well. All the Rohingyas present there were beaten
in a group by the Bengalis, who were heard saying things like, ‘You
Rohingyas are spoiling our life; you Rohingyas are destroying our soci-
ety; you Rohingyas are damaging our everything.’ I was present in Ukhia
Cotbazar at the time and observed the entire event standing close by.
After two days, on 16 October 2016, I met Selim at his home in Ukhia.
 Of Hurting and Hosting 73

I would like to mention here that I tried to release the Rohingya youths,
but my attempts did not bear fruit. However, finally they were released.
I met his wife and his mother who explained to me and convinced me
that Selim had taken his mother to Teknaf to see his eldest uncle on
Friday (14 October 2018). Selim’s mother asked me, ‘How could it be
possible for Selim to snatch money from a businessman in Ukhia while
he was in Teknaf? He took me to Teknaf in the morning and brought
me back to Ukhia in the afternoon. Why was my son beaten up inhu-
manly in the bazar in front of all? Is this because we are Rohingyas? Is
this because we are not manush (human beings)?’ Selim’s mother was
talking as if she was asking me the answer as I, being a Bengali, appar-
ently represented the host community in the situation. I did not have
any answer to her questions.
Makbul’s statement, the event of Cotbazar, and the subsequent
questions raised by Selim’s mother paints a clear picture of the crisis
of social integration of the Rohingya refugees in Ukhia and Teknaf, the
south-eastern part of Bangladesh.
What are the reasons that turned the warm and brotherly relationship
between the Rohingya refugees and the local Bengalis into a confronta-
tional one? And what led to the Bangladeshi hosts seeing the Rohingyas
as lesser than human? I think the following points of conflict could
be the principal causes48 for the now decaying relationship between
them: (1) cultural differences between the Bengalis and the Rohingyas;
(2) contest over the local job market and cheap, informal, skilled,
and unskilled labour; (3) threat to the prevailing ethnic endogamy in
Bangladesh; (4) environmental degradation and destruction of forest
resources; (5) decline in law and order due to rise in criminal offences,
reportedly committed by the Rohingyas; and (6) the rise in militant
activities carried out by the Rohingyas. While details on the six prin-
ciple causes have been discussed with ethnographic data in Chapter 4,
here, I will discuss a couple of first-hand experiences that explain why
the dealings of local Bengalis seem to be hurting the Rohingyas.
Kalimullah, the beyai of my host Mohammad Ali, lives in the east-
ern corner of Pasan Para. He is an honest and emotional man with a
soft personality. He gave shelter to Muslim Uddin, a Rohingya, who
came from Myanmar in 1992. Muslim was accompanied by four other
members of his family, his wife, two daughters, and one son. It was
difficult for Kalimullah to give shelter to a family of five for a long time
74 The Rohingya

as his own family had six members. After a few days of their arrival,
Kalimullah proposed to build a temporary house in the yard beside
his own house on the agreement that Muslim would try to find shelter
somewhere else and leave Kalimullah’s house at the earliest. It has been
almost 26 years, but Muslim and his family members still live there.
Meanwhile, they have built a brick house. Kalimullah made several
attempts to evacuate them but failed. In subsequent years, Muslim
gained popularity and power as he became a leader of the Rohingya
community, finding strong linkages with the local political parties
and many international human rights agencies. Whenever Kalimullah
goes to law enforcement agencies and if the police comes to evacuate
the Rohingya family, in response, it suddenly appears as a question of
human rights violation, drawing media focus.
This is, in fact, one side of the coin. There is another side to it. During
my fieldwork, I observed innumerable counts of human rights viola-
tions committed by local Bengalis, security forces, and law enforcement
agencies, which remained unaddressed most of the time.49 Using forced
labour of Rohingya refugees at a cheap remuneration or even without
payment; physical attacks without any sensible reason; sexual harass-
ment of Rohingya women; torture by security forces without any rea-
son; evacuating them from their temporary shelter without any notice;
and so on50 have been common phenomena in the lives of Rohingya
refugees living in and around Teknaf and Ukhia. I recorded many facts
and events of such violations of human rights, which the Rohingyas
really feel as hurting by the hosts. Badruduzza (42), a Rohingya, one
evening in 2012, explained to me:

We also think that it is really difficult for a country to adopt and feed
more than 500,000 additional people51 in her land. It is also true that we
Rohingyas have become, to some extent, a burden for this locality, which
itself is an overcrowded and resource-poor area. I also admit that many
of us, of course not all, have become involved in many social crimes
that are destabilizing the local law and order system. Where will we go?
Myanmar does not recognize us as its citizens on the one hand, and
Bangladesh does not recognize us even as refugees, let alone citizens.
What should we do? Nobody wants to employ us since we are Rohingyas
and refugees. How will we feed our family? Starvation has become an
inexplicable part of our life. Our children are suffering from malnutri-
tion. How will we survive? Finding no other alternative, if we cut trees
 Of Hurting and Hosting 75

and sell in the market as firewood, we are accused of destroying the forest
resources. What should we do to earn our livelihood? Is it our fault that
we were born in this universe?

This narrative reflects the crisis of Rohingya refugees at the local level,
which hardly features in the state’s understanding of the Rohingya prob-
lem. The main problem is indeed the question of survival. Whatever the
Rohingyas do is more or less driven by the crucial question of survival
but, on the other hand, is creating problems for the local people who
once hosted them.
I started this chapter with a case of elopement that reflected the
structure of relations between Bengalis and Rohingyas in Teknaf and
Ukhia. At the end of this chapter, I can cite another recent case of elope-
ment that is good enough for the Rohingyas to define and refine the
‘treatment of host community’ as ‘hurting’. In order to settle the dispute
between two families—one Rohingya and one local Bengali family—
over an elopement case, an arbitrary meeting was called, where we can
find the relations between the Rohingya refugee and the Bengali host
society. I have used this case study in a forthcoming book chapter, but
considering its strong relevance, I am citing the case here as well. Farid
Uddin (54) is a Rohingya who came to Bangladesh in 1991 and settled
down in Vasan Para. He told me about a local dispute settlement case
in the local union parishad office:

Mr Sirajul Islam, the elected member of a union parishad in Teknaf

upazila, called a meeting at his office in 2014 at the request of Harun-
Ar-Rashid, a local Bengali. I was summoned to attend the meeting. Many
other local Bengalis were present there. A school teacher was also present
there. Some local political leaders also attended the meeting. My daugh-
ter, Khushbu (19), and her husband, Karim (27), were there. I was sur-
prised to see my daughter there because Khushbu had gone missing six
days ago. I came to know that she had eloped with Karim and they had
gotten married. I did not find them anywhere in Teknaf. I was rather
happy to see my daughter. Mr Harun [had] complained to Mr Sirajul
Islam against me and my daughter because, as per his complaint, my
daughter and I had deliberately flattered and deluded his son Karim
into marrying Khushbu. Therefore, he had been emotionally black-
mailed into marrying my daughter. Now, Harun wanted his son back
and demanded that my daughter should go back home. Sirajul Islam
was asking my opinion. I tried to convince Mr Sirajul Islam and others
76 The Rohingya

present there that a matured boy and girl had consciously decided to
marry each other and done so accordingly. They had stayed together for
six days as husband and wife. How could I bring my daughter back? It
would be injustice to my daughter and my family. It would destroy my
daughter’s life and her future and bring social stigma to my family. I had
still a couple of daughters and their future would be at risk too. I tried to
convince the people present there with all my logic, emotions, requests,
and earnest appeals. But all went in vain. Finally, Sirajul Islam gave a
decision that it was still not too late and Khushbu should go back home
and Karim would not meet her again in future. The decision was final, so
I could not do anything. I came back home with my daughter who was
crying as if her heart was bleeding. That night, my daughter committed
suicide by hanging herself from the ceiling fan in her room using a scarf. I
could do nothing but accept the writing of fate because we are Rohingyas.
We have no one to complain to.52

This case shows how several local Bengalis deal with Rohingya refu-
gees, where an unjust, unfair, and one-sided decision is made in favour
of the host community while the refugees are left in an extremely vul-
nerable position. Therefore, the Rohingyas conceptualize the dealings,
behaviour, and treatment by the local Bengalis as ‘hurting’ because
there are some valid reasons behind it.
In fact, mutual co-existence is also a big problem since both groups,
despite religious and linguistic homogeneity, are different in their
culture, mode of dealings, and philosophy of life. These differences
also make the Rohingyas understand that the hosts are now hurting
them because local people, insofar as my experience goes, are no lon-
ger ready to accept the Rohingya refugees in their locality. It is mainly
because Rohingyas, as many local Bengalis claim, have created and are
still creating lots of problems in their regular course of life. UNHCR
and other international NGOs are paying attention to in-camp regis-
tered Rohingya refugees only, whereas large numbers of unregistered
Rohingya refugees are left unaddressed in their agenda. Though follow-
ing the influx of 2017, newly arrived Rohingyas are now paid adequate
attention, it is also creating deep frustration and dissatisfaction among
the local Bengalis, because they think the local Bengalis are getting left
out in the entire ‘take care’ programme53 happening in the locality. The
central state is also reluctant to reassure them in any way. This sort
of reluctance on the part of the national and international agencies
 Of Hurting and Hosting 77

working in this area is also accelerating problems in the lives of the

local people and the Rohingya refugees.

***

In fact, whenever Rohingya refugees attempt to enter any aspects of

the local life for the sake of survival, local people take it as unfair pen-
etration and resist it. The resistance from local people appears to the
Rohingyas as ‘hurting’, since it denies them access to possible sources
of livelihood, and hence, they trapped in the crisis of survival. From the
point of view of local people, they have every right to protect their lives,
livelihood, and society by resisting Rohingya penetration, and from the
Rohingya point of view, they have every right to survive and lead a life as
human beings. Now the question of who will ensure the rights of both
the local people and the Rohingya refugees is operationally and effec-
tively absent. The state is always in a dilemma of whether to make room
for Rohingya refugees or to repatriate them to Myanmar. International
agencies, including UNHCR, IOM, and MSF, are putting pressure on
the Bangladesh government to be tolerant in hosting Rohingya refugees
in their land. This top-level contestation does not provide any effective
solution to what the local Bengalis and the Rohingyas are encountering
in their everyday life in the local-level social settings. In conclusion, I
would rather say that hosts should not hurt the guests but why, how,
and in what context hosts usually hurt (!) the guests should also be
understood and given equal importance in order to lay down a com-
prehensive approach to resolve the social integration crisis of Rohingya
refugees. This is because we must remember that every coin has two
sides and both are equally important.

Notes
1. The total number of Rohingya refugees living in Bangladesh is estimated
to be more than 1,300,000. The biometric database prepared by the Bangladesh
government includes 1,132,000, but a good number of Rohingyas still remain
unrecorded.
2. According to the Bangladesh Population Census 2011, the total popu-
lation of Teknaf upazila is 264,389 while that of Ukhia upazila is 207,379, but
the total Rohingyas are more than 1,200,000. Therefore, many media outlets
78 The Rohingya

published reports that Rohingyas outnumber the locals in Teknaf and Ukhia. See
‘Rohingyas Outnumber Locals in Ukhia, Teknaf,’ Daily Independent, 27 October
2017, accessed 6 April 2014, http://www.theindependentbd.com/post/120913;
Mayesha Alam, ‘How the Rohingya Crisis Is Affecting Bangladesh—And Why it
Matters,’ Washington Post, 12 February 2018, accessed 16 August 2018, https://www.
washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/02/12/how-the-rohingya-
crisis-is-affecting-bangladesh-and-why-it matters/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.
4f85f11f7cb0; Tarek Mahmud, ‘Rohingya Influx: Refugees Outnumber
Ukhia, Teknaf Locals,’ Dhaka Tribune, 23 October 2017, accessed 16 August
2018, https://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2017/10/23/rohingya-influx-
refugees-outnumber-Ukhia-teknaf-locals/.
3. Nasir Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting: Crises in Co-existence with
Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’ in To Host or To Hurt: Counter-Narratives
on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh, ed. Nasir Uddin (Dhaka: Institute of
Culture and Development Research, 2012a), 84.; Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas,
but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka:
Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b); K. Fahmida Farzana, Memories of Burmese
Rohingya Refugees: Contested Identities and Belonging (London: Palgrave
MacMillan, 2017); Delwar Hossain, ‘Tracing the Plight of the Rohingyas,’ in The
Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas, ed. Imtiaz Ahmed (2010; Dhaka: The University
Press Limited, 2014), 22.
4. By newer dimensions, I mean that additional Rohingyas, about 700,000,
need additional shelters, food supply, sanitation, water supply, and everyday
essentials, which is creating tremendous pressure on local resources and
facilities.
5. See Gil Loescher and James Milner, Protracted Refugee Situations: Domestic
and International Security Implications (London and New York: Routledge,
2005).
6. Loescher and Milner, Protracted Refugee Situations.
7. Alison Mountz, Seeking Asylum: Human Smuggling and Bureaucracy at the
Border (Minneapolis and London: Minnesota University Press, 2010).
8. Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting,’ 83.
9. All Rohingyas are not refugees in official records even before 2017. Only
those who live in the Kutupalong and Nayapara official refugee camps are offi-
cially designated as refugees. However, in the locality, people in general tend to
identify them as ‘Rohingya refugees’. Therefore, when I write ‘refugees’ I mean
all Rohingyas, irrespective of whether they are registered or unregistered, as
local people tend to term it.
10. See Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting’.
11. For example, see Edward Mogire, Victims as Security Threats: Refugee
Impact on Host State Security in Africa (England and USA: Ashgate Publishing
 Of Hurting and Hosting 79

Limited, 2011); Loescher and Milner, Protracted Refugee Situations; Mountz,

Seeking Asylum.
12. Bangladesh could be cited as an example here, since the basic principle
of Bangladesh foreign policy stated in the constitution is ‘friendship to all,
enemy to none’.
13. See Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting,’ 84.
14. A Japan-based human rights organization ‘Human Rights Now’ has
recently published a report on the human rights situation of the Rohingyas in
both Myanmar and Bangladesh. The report has categorically blamed Myanmar
for serious human rights violations, but at the same time it has also criticized
Bangladesh for violating human rights of the Rohingyas. See ‘Investigative
Report of Rohingya Refugee Camps in Bangladesh,’ Human Rights Now,
accessed 18 August 2018, http://hrn.or.jp/eng/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/
Investigative-Report-of-Rohingya-Refugee-Camps-in-Bangladesh.pdf. Academics
also criticized Bangladesh, although with a soft tone, for violating the human
rights of the Rohingyas. For details, see A.K.M. Ahsan Ullah, ‘Rohingya Refugees
to Bangladesh: Historical Exclusion and Contemporary Marginalization,’ Journal
of Immigration and Refugee Studies 9, no. 2 (2011): 139–61; Nasir Uddin, ‘State
of Stateless People: The Plight of Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’ in Human
Rights to Citizens: A Slippery Concept, ed. Rhoda Howard-Hassmann and Margaret
Walton-Roberts (USA: The University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015), 62–77.
15. See Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting,’ 85; Uddin, ‘State of Stateless
People,’ 63.
16. Helaluddin Arefeen, ‘Some Aspects of Lineage Organization among the
Muslims of Bangladesh,’ Man in India 92, no. 1 (2012): 1–12.
17. See Nicoletta Del Franco, Negotiating Adolescence in Rural Bangladesh: A
Journey through School, Love and Marriage (New Delhi: Zubaan, 2012).
18. See Arefeen, ‘Some Aspects of Lineage Organization among the Muslims
of Bangladesh’.
19. Elora Shehabuddin, Reshaping the Holy: Democracy, Development, and
Muslim Women in Bangladesh (New York: Columbia University Press, 2008).
20. Samaj is a kind of social organization that works as an agency of social
control and exercises an informal judicial system in rural Bangladesh. Samaj
consists of elderly persons in the village, the imam of the mosque, chairperson
or members of the local government, principal of the local school, and members
of some renowned families (like lineage of chowdhry, talukder, chairman, and
old zamindar) who claim that their sacred duty is to ensure social norms, val-
ues, tradition, and justice in the society. See Ashraful Aziz, Kinship in Bangladesh
(Dhaka: ICDDR’B, 1979); Arefeen, ‘Some Aspects of Lineage Organization
among the Muslims of Bangladesh’; M. Rezaul Islam, NGOs, Social Capital, and
Community Empowerment in Bangladesh (Singapore: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016).
80 The Rohingya

21. I have used the age of every informant here in relation to citation so that
readers can easily understand the context of the facts and events of action and
actors in different citations.
22. Bangsha in Bangladesh and Bengali society carries family status and
social prestige, which is instrumental in the social fabric in dealing, interact-
ing, and communicating with and among individuals. Therefore, the prestige
of bangsha is always regarded highly. This is crucial in arranged marriages and
spouse selection with the consent of the family. Besides, names and lineages
of bangsha also play an important role in maintaining social cohesion and are
used as an influential agency of social control. For details, see Aziz, Kinship in
Bangladesh; Arefeen, ‘Some Aspects of Lineage Organization among the Muslims
of Bangladesh’.
23. Affinal relation indicates a type of kinship that develops based on mar-
riage. In anthropology, kinships are of three kinds: affinal (through marriage),
consanguineal (through blood relations), and fictive (emotionally significant
relationship unrelated by marriage or birth).
24. ‘Beyai’ is a local term that is usually used to refer to people whose
son and daughter get married. This is a commonly used term in the south-
eastern region in Bangladesh. In other parts of Bangladesh, ‘beyai’ is a term
used to refer to the bride and bridegroom’s younger brothers and sisters. Beyai
in kinship terminology in Bangladesh also denotes a joking relation between
individuals. For details, see Helaluddin Arefeen, Changing Agrarian Structure in
Bangladesh: Shimulia, A Study of a Periurban Village (Dhaka: Centre for Social
Studies, 1986).
25. See, Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting,’ 86.
26. Among the 32 refugee camps, the main ones that are mentionable
and big in size are Kutupalong, Nayapara, Taal, Leda, Balukhali, Tangkhali,
Hariakhali, Unchiprang, and Shalbagan camps.
27. Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting,’ 87.
28. See Chris Lewa, Unregistered Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Crackdown,
Forced Displacement and Hunger (Bangkok: The Arakan Project, 2010); Uddin, ‘Of
Hosting and Hurting’; Imtiaz Ahmed, ed., The Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas:
Responses of the State, Society and International Community (Dhaka: The University
Press Limited, 2014).
29. Nasir Uddin, ‘Treatment of Unwelcome Guests: A Case of the Rohingya
Refugees in Bangladesh’ (Paper presented in the international conference on
The Political Economy of South Asian Migrants, South Asian Region Formation
Research Society, University of Delhi, India, 24–26 November 2010).
30. Ishaan Tharoor, ‘The World Let a Genocide Unfold,’ Washington Post,
18 December 2017, accessed 16 August 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/
 Of Hurting and Hosting 81

news/worldviews/wp/2017/12/18/in-2017-the-world-let-a-genocide-unfold/?
utm_term=.7a0d47d96530.
31. Nell Gabiam, The Politics of Suffering: Syria’s Palestinian Refugee Camps
(Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2016).
32. Gabiam, The Politics of Suffering.
33. See Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting’.
34. See Nasir Uddin, ed., To Host or To Hurt: Counter Narratives on Rohingya
Refugee Issue in Bangladesh (Dhaka: Institute for Culture and Development
Research [ICDR], 2012b).
35. See Lewa, Unregistered Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh.
36. ‘Bormaya people’ means people from Burma, now Myanmar. Local
people quite often term the Rohingyas as Bormaya people.
37. Bangladesh Awami League (AL), which is now in power.
38. Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which is now in opposition.
39. It should be clarified here that following the massive influx that took
place in 2017, many national and international organizations came forward
with various kinds of support to help meet the incoming refugees’ basic needs.
Thereafter, the Rohingya situation started taking a different shape. My experi-
ence does not essentially confirm that newly arrived ‘helps and supports’ have
ensured the ‘minimum standard of living’ after 2017, this will be discussed in
the later chapters. This chapter is mostly based on my first-hand experience
on the crises of social integration of Rohingyas refugees in the context of the
‘refugee situation before 2017’.
40. See Uddin, ‘Of Hosting and Hurting’, 86.
41. Hossain, ‘Tracing the Plight of the Rohingyas,’ 22.
42. Bangladesh, from the very beginning of the Rohingya influx, was reluc-
tant to let them in because of three reasons: (1) Bangladesh is a poor country,
and hence, it cannot host refugees; (2) it is already an overpopulated country,
and hence, it cannot be burdened with additional people; and (3) it is not a
signatory state of the UN Refugee Convention 1951, so it is not legally bound
to host Rohingya refugees in its land. See Ahmed, The Plight of the Stateless
Rohingyas; Uddin, ‘Treatment of Unwelcome Guests’.
43. Of course, I heard it long before 1997 as I was a local resident of Cox’s
Bazar, but I started recording the narratives, quotations, and statements of both
Rohingyas and local Bengalis only since 1997 when I started my professional
research on the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.
44. See Chapters 4, 5, and 6.
45. Whenever the local people talk about Rohingya Muslims, many of them
often refer to them as ‘Muslim brothers’. They do not say ‘brothers and sisters’,
but they mean both when they utter ‘Muslims brothers’. Therefore, when I quote
82 The Rohingya

their narrative, I have tried to keep their statements as is. Hence, I have used
‘Muslim brothers’.
46. The people who live in the Chittagong region are widely and popularly
known as Chittagonian people.
47. Ukhia Cotbazar is a famous place in Ukhia within Cox’s Bazar. It is
basically a marketplace with a bus station from where people can catch a con-
necting bus to Cox’s Bazar, Chittagong, and even Dhaka. Also, people can go
to Teknaf from Cotbazar. Besides, Ukhia Cotbazar is the centre point to visit
Rohingya camps, particularly Kutupalong in Ukhia and Nayapara in Teknaf. It
seems to be an urban space in the semi-urban city of Ukhia and Teknaf.
48. For details, see Uddin, ‘Treatment of Unwelcome Guests’; Uddin, ‘Of
Hosting and Hurting’; Uddin, ‘State of Stateless People’.
49. See Chapters 4, 5, and 6.
50. In support of all these issues, plenty of case studies are presented in the
later chapters. In order to avoid redundancy, I have refrained from putting cases
one after the other here.
51. In 2012, the total number of Rohingyas refugees was about 500,000.
52. Nasir Uddin, ‘The State, Vulnerability, and Transborder Movement:
The Rohingyas in Myanmar and Bangladesh,’ in Deterritorialised Identity and
Transborder Movements in South Asia, eds. Nasir Uddin and Nasreen Chowdhory
(Singapore: Springer, 2019c), 73–90.
53. Following the new influx that started on 25 August 2017, many interna-
tional agencies, donor countries, and UN bodies are providing huge amount of
reliefs to support their immediate survival. Local communities have been com-
pletely left out of this relief programme, which is creating a deep dissatisfaction
among the locals.
 State of Stateless People
4 The Struggle for Existence and the Cry
for Survival

T his chapter aims to take the readers through the intricate condi-
tions of the Rohingyas—a world of statelessness, non-citizenship,
and human rights abuse. Although the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights (1948) ascertains that ‘everyone has the right to a
nationality’1 or citizenship, globally, there are millions of people2 who
can be defined as non-citizens. These are the people who are stateless
and are not recognized as nationals by any state.3 Since citizenship
is a reciprocal relationship of rights and duties between individuals
and the state, the stateless people cannot claim any rights from any
state because citizenship is what Hannah Arendt calls, ‘the right to
have all rights’.4 In some cases, international human rights law confers
equal rights on both citizens and non-citizens.5 However, since many
countries do not comply with international conventions such as the
International Refugee Convention (1951), the Convention relating to
Status of Stateless People (1954), and the International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights (1966), the rights of stateless people are not
legally and constitutionally ensured everywhere in the world. Besides,
the nature and policy of many states create a social, economic, and
political environment that is very unfavourable for the refugees, asy-
lum seekers, and stateless people.
Refugees and asylum seekers are also considered non-citizens in
host countries and are frequently deprived of rights conferred by
The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
84 The Rohingya

international human rights law. The lives of non-citizens, refugees,

and asylum seekers are marked by their always already precarious
struggle for survival and existence. Poor access to food, clean water,
safe shelter, education, means of livelihood, healthcare, proper sani-
tation, and the absolute absence of social, political, and civil rights
makes the lives of non-citizens, stateless people, and refugees acutely
vulnerable. Owing to the lack of all forms of rights and an absence
of minimum space for survival, such individuals can become objects
of exploitation, oppression, torture, and sexual harassment, and are
even subject to state persecution. They are most often treated as if
they are lesser than human, bringing alive what Giorgio Agamben
terms as ‘bare life’. Agamben used the phrase homo sacer to embody
‘bare life’. He explains that this life is ‘bare’ because it can be taken
away by anyone without any legal arbitration and without incurring
the culpability of homicide. ‘Bare life’ is practically ‘bare’ because it
does not exist ‘before the law’. Anybody can kill a ‘bare life’ and not
be accused of homicide as s/he is also outside the purview of law.6
Therefore, Agamben’s theory is important to understand the degree of
vulnerability that stateless people experience in everyday life, a condi-
tion that is reproduced by the state’s discourse of non-citizenship.
However, I differ from Agamben’s idea of ‘bare life’ to depict the
extremely vulnerable conditionalities of ‘people’ by framing a new
idea of ‘subhuman’, which I will discuss in detail in the later chapters.
Nonetheless, I still think that Agamben is instrumental to understand
the conditions of statelessness, non-citizenship, and refugeehood to
some extent. In fact, the structure of the modern nation state pro-
duces the legal status of people in the name of ‘citizenship’, which
makes others ‘non-citizens’, rendering them stateless and making
them more vulnerable than others. Within the theoretical premise
of statelessness, the lack of citizenship and refugeehood are compo-
nents of this critical condition of ‘bare life’. Relevant also is Margaret
Walton-Roberts’s idea of slippery citizenship in which ‘slipperiness of
citizenship is fast becoming the norm for already vulnerable subjects,
and in some cases is also generating further vulnerability’.7 This chap-
ter examines the plight of the Rohingyas in Bangladesh living under
the triple burden of refugeehood, statelessness, and human rights
abuses.
 State of Stateless People 85

State of Stateless People: The Plight of the Rohingyas

in Bangladesh
The plight of the Rohingyas in Bangladesh can be understood by ana-
lysing how the state and host society deal with them because the ‘state’
of their living status is largely determined by the way in which the state
and society host them. Institutional engagement, at both national and
international levels, is also imperative for understanding the condi-
tions of the Rohingyas in Bangladesh because the international com-
munity often claims that they are standing by the Rohingyas. I will
discuss the plight of the Rohingyas as a stateless group in Bangladesh
in two separate sections: relations with the state and relations with the
host society.

Relations with the State

In the late 1970s and the early 1990s, Bangladesh took every emergency
measure to assist the Rohingyas entering Bangladesh, to ensure their
minimum standard of living and their survival with the fulfilment of
minimum necessities. Therefore, it can be stated that the ‘commitment
undertaken by the GoB to assist these refugees, despite the fact that the
state was not a signatory to the UN convention, was notable’.8
Soon after the Rohingyas migrated, four Bangladeshi ministries—
the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Ministry of Food and Disaster
Management—became actively involved in providing them with basic
human needs and monitoring the refugee9 situation. Bangladesh estab-
lished 20 refugee camps for the Rohingyas along the road to Teknaf.
While Bangladesh was providing administrative support for monitoring
the refugee situation and camp management, UN agencies—UNHCR,
World Food Programme (WFP), UNICEF, World Health Organization
(WHO)—were providing financial and logistical support. The GoB
coordinated this massive refugee situation, temporary settlement, and
later the gradual repatriation to Myanmar with the help of the UN and
UNHCR. The remaining registered Rohingyas started living in two official
camps in Cox’s Bazar, but their living conditions were miserable, albeit
marginally better than the conditions of the unregistered Rohingyas.10
86 The Rohingya

It is to be noted here that this was the situation before the influx of
2016 and 2017 took place, and soon after this, the situation worsened,
which I will discuss in detail in Chapters 5 and 6. However, the camps’
situation was not essentially ‘better’ in the strict sense of the term. Kristy
Crabtree explains, ‘the refugee camps have been ranked among the
world’s worst; there have been reports of rape and corporal punishment
by the local population, and shelters are shoddily maintained by ran-
dom pieces of tarp, plastic, and bamboo.’11 Concern regarding the state
of these camps is further highlighted by the number of spontaneous
and makeshift camps established in Teknaf and Ukhia.
Despite the GoB’s efforts to assist the refugees, from the very begin-
ning, the Rohingyas were regarded by the state as a burden that cre-
ated additional pressure on local resources.12 Therefore, from the very
beginning, the GoB tried to repatriate them to Myanmar by signing
different bilateral agreements, one in 1978 and another in 1991/92. In
fact, some have argued that ‘voluntary repatriation is the only durable
solution available to refugees: ruling out the possibility of local integra-
tion’,13 particularly in the context of the Rohingyas’ social integration in
the Bengali rural social setting. Nevertheless, the Rohingyas have gradu-
ally become more reluctant to be repatriated because the situation in
Rakhine State remains unchanged and has, on the contrary, worsened
over time. So many rendered stateless have lost hope of regaining
citizenship rights in Myanmar. Thereby, many Rohingya families have
integrated with the local society either through social interactions such
as affinal relations, or through bilateral trade and employment agree-
ments. With the help of UNHCR and its partner agencies, the GoB
has been attempting to secure food and daily essentials. The camps
have been set up only for those who are officially registered, leaving
a huge number of unregistered refugees without support. However,
I must admit that the Rohingyas are living in relatively ‘better’ con-
ditions in temporarily built refugee camps after the 2016–17 influx,
because the GoB, with the help of IOM and the UNHCR, along with
many other GOs and NGOs, are taking care of them on an urgent and
emergency basis and trying to provide basic essentials to them, though
the resources remain inadequate. It is crucial to note that prior to the
2016–17 influx, due to the growing anti-Rohingya sentiments encour-
aged by the political elites as well as the local media, law enforcement
agencies, border security forces, local government bodies, and civil
 State of Stateless People 87

administration would actively report and incarcerate unregistered

Rohingyas as ‘illegal migrants’, who were then subjected to detention
and forced repatriation. Recipients of such a targeted hunt and return
were not just the new migrants, but also the older migrants. In her
work, Chris Lewa explains:

Unregistered Rohingya refugees have settled among the local population

… eking out a hand-to-mouth existence without any humanitarian assis-
tance, vulnerable to exploitation and arrest. … Bangladesh has generally
tolerated their presence, but anti-Rohingya sentiments have steadily
grown among the local population, manipulated by the local political
elite and the media. … In parallel, at the end of 2007, the Bangladesh law
enforcement agencies started arresting and pushing back Rohingya across
the border to Burma. Initially, only new arrivals were targeted, but since
mid-2009, self-settled refugees have also been deported.14

Forceful repatriation became the norm for both the unregistered15

and registered refugees. There are many examples of resistance against
forced repatriation demonstrated by registered refugees in both
Kutupalong and Nayapara camps. Sometimes, security forces physically
torture refugees16 in order to force them to cross the border, though
the last time this happened was before 2017. At Nayapara camp, some
12,000 refugees refused food rations provided by the authorities in
1997 as a form of protest against forcible repatriation. ‘Apparently, this
was in reaction to earlier incidents in which women and children were
allegedly hit with batons and forced into boats by Bangladeshi officials
prior to making the Naaf River crossing into Arakan.’17 Similar resis-
tance was observed in 2004, 2009, and 2011. In 2004, a group in the
Nayapara camp staged a demonstration in protest of the GoB’s steps to
repatriate them to Rakhine State. In 2009, when there was an attempt to
bring the Rohingyas back to Myanmar, the new generation of Rohingyas
who were born in Bangladesh after 1978 strongly resisted the move and
clearly declined to return to Myanmar.18 In 2011, there was another
attempt made by the GoB to accelerate the repatriation process, but
majority of the Rohingyas strongly resisted the move, claiming that the
situation in Rakhine State had worsened gradually and they did not
want to go back only to put their lives at risk once again. During that
time, I was doing fieldwork in Teknaf and talked to some protesters
who outright declined to return to Myanmar because, as they said,
88 The Rohingya

‘We cannot jump into the fire knowing everything beforehand.’ Some
others tried to justify their willingness to stay in Bangladesh from a
religious point of view. Their reason was, ‘If we need to die, we will die
in Bangladesh. In an Islamic country like Bangladesh where majority
people are Muslims, we will at least receive the fate of having “funeral
rituals” according to Islamic principles. If we die in Buddhist countries,
we will die like non-Muslims. So, we are not going back to Myanmar in
this situation without any life security. ’
Even very recently, when the GoB, backed by mounting international
pressure, compelled Myanmar to sign an ‘agreement’19 to start a fresh
repatriation process in 2017 and 2018, the newly arrived Rohingyas
demonstrated their reluctance to go back. The GoB attempted two repa-
triation drives (on 15 November 2018 and 22 August 2019), but failed.
Instead, they pressed various charters of demands before starting any
sort of repatriation process. Rohingyas are not organized in a formal way
to set up any uniform charter of demands collectively, I have seen three
types of list of demands: (1) one in the form of computer-composed
leaflets, which includes 9-point demands;20 (2) second one is in the
form of hand-written banners, which shows 12-point demands;21 and
(3) third one is a printed signboard which displays 13-point demands.22

Figure 4.1 Inside view of the Rohingya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazar
Source: Author’s personal collection.
 State of Stateless People 89

It is also interesting to note here that during this demonstration, I was

in Ukhia and was trying to investigate the process of framing this char-
ter of demands and how each was connected to the other group of
demonstrators. I found no connection as such and no formal commu-
nication between the demonstrators, but their points of demands had
a lot of similarities. All charters of demands included a few common
points such as: (1) the Myanmar government must publicly announce
that it is giving the Rohingyas their long-denied citizenship and would
include them in the list of the country’s recognized ethnic groups; (2)
the land once occupied by the Rohingyas must be returned to them
and their homes, mosques, and schools should be rebuilt; (3) the mili-
tary should be held accountable for the alleged killings, lootings, and
rapes, and should stand trial under international legal framework; (4)
the ‘innocent Rohingyas’ who were picked up in counter-insurgency
operations must be released unconditionally; (5) the Rohingyas will
only return when a neutral safeguard like a UN peacekeeping force will
help them in their safe return; and (6) Myanmar should stop listing the
Rohingyas with their photographs as ‘terrorists’ in state media and on
government Facebook pages.23
It is to be mentioned here that even after four decades since 1978,
the Rohingyas are denied freedom of movement, the right to work, and
the right to education in Myanmar, and thus are denied the chance for
self-reliance and self-determination in Myanmar, while also suffering
the same in Bangladesh as refugees. Prytz Phiri explained, ‘Rohingya
refugees of Bangladesh are forced to engage in clandestine activity,
working illegally and for low wages. They have been suffering much
from ensuring minimum standard of life and basic human needs.’24
Many unregistered Rohingyas, before the new influx in 2017, lived in
makeshift camps in crude huts thrown together with bin liners, sticks,
and mud. Sanitation was abysmal. Sewage facilities, hugely inadequate
in the monsoon season, ran alongside the housing. A 2009 survey con-
ducted by MSF found that 40 per cent of deaths in these unregistered
camps were due to diarrhoea.25 I have recorded many cases during my
fieldwork, before 2017, where Rohingya children died of diarrhoea
and malaria due to the lack of sanitation facilities, safe drinking water
supply, and limited access to minimum medical facilities. One of my
key informants, Johir Uddin26 (54), a Rohingya, explained to me, in
2012, about their helplessness in connection to this health and disease
90 The Rohingya

issue. Johir came to Bangladesh in 2009 and, since then, he has been
living in the Kutupalong Taal makeshift camp. He sometimes works as
a day labourer, sometimes goes for boat fishing, and sometimes works
at home making and repairing27 fishing nets. He explained to me:

When anybody becomes sick or needs emergency medical services, we

cannot immediately take him/her to the hospital as we are not allowed
to go there. We cannot even go to a private clinic for emergency cases as
doctors turn us away saying, ‘You are Rohingyas. You are illegal. You are
destroying our lives here. We should not help you survive. You better
go back to Myanmar.’ While we are dying, they are thinking of who a
Rohingya is and who a non-Rohingya is.

Though Johir’s experience was critical in 2012, there are now some
NGOs such as the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee, now
Building Recourses Across Community (BRAC), and international
organizations such as the MSF that work in the Ukhia and Kutupalong
areas to provide medical facilities to the Rohingyas. Following the 2017
influx, now the NGO Save The Children is also providing medical ser-
vices on a very large scale along with regular support provided by the
health department of the Ministry of Public Health of the GoB. Johir
was not only talking about the crisis of health service but also about
the miserable conditions of the unregistered Rohingyas in Bangladesh.
Since they were unregistered, they had to go through various forms of
critical experiences. Johir continued:

Since we are considered illegal residents, we cannot seek help from law
enforcement agencies, local administration, government hospitals, and
even from UNHCR. Police, security forces, Border Guards Bangladesh
(BGB), paramilitary forces, and even the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB)28
quite often raid and arrest us in order to push us back to Myanmar. I
was arrested in January 2009 and thrown into the Naf River29 to swim
across the border. When I refused to do so, BGB personnel kicked me
on my hip due to which I fell into the Naf. My elder son was shot dead
on the spot. On the Myanmar side, the Nasaka30 arrested us in groups
and tortured us in ways I cannot dare to describe. We were pushed back
to Bangladesh yet again. Swimming for hours to cross the Naf and walk-
ing three days through the jungles, we returned to Bangladesh. This is
the life we lead. To whom do we complain? To whom are we to appeal?
From whom should we seek a minimum space for living? We are the
people who belong to no state.
 State of Stateless People 91

The cruelty, brutality, and the absolute inhumanity experienced by

the Rohingyas because of the state’s forces is rampant, Johir Uddin being
only one of the many such survivors rendered stateless. Their identity
as non-citizens permits them to be seen as lesser than human or what I
call ‘subhuman’. All this happens to the Rohingyas primarily because of
their status as non-citizens in both Bangladesh and Myanmar, although
I have argued in this book that ‘citizenship’ is not the only cause and
remedy.31
In addition to the brutalities, the violence committed against state-
less subjects includes cases of sexual violence and rape of Rohingya
girls by local Bengalis and the security forces. Victims cannot seek
justice from any agency of the state as they are non-citizens, and their
precariousness turns them into objects of the worst kinds of exploita-
tion. As Matthew Gibney reminds us, citizenship ‘is a gateway to other
rights … the stateless are lacking the very right to have rights’,32 which
is also famously stated in Hannah Arendt’s works as citizenship is the
right to have rights.33 The Rohingyas cannot even file a case with the
police, since they are not eligible to do so as ‘illegal migrants’ and
unregistered Rohingyas. Local people, police, and security forces use
this vulnerability to their own advantage and are frequently reported
to be sexually harassing Rohingya girls during raids and forced repa-
triations. Though many such cases do not become public, it hap-
pens behind the ‘known means of information’34 in Bangladesh. I
recorded one such case where the father of a raped girl talked to me
in 2012. They then lived in Ukhia, but neither in the Rohingya camp
(Kutupalong) nor in Pasan Para, where I did my fieldwork. They were
living in a makeshift camp, Taal, in a temporarily built house with a
plastic roof.
The father narrated the incident which took place that evening:

With much shame for me, I will tell you about a critical incident in
my daughter’s life, which has literally made her abnormal. I had just
crossed the border to Bangladesh and was living with my family in the
borderland of Bangladesh and Myanmar. One late night, we were raided
by the Bangladeshi security force who threatened to send us back to
Myanmar. Suddenly, one of them saw my daughter and attempted to
rape her. My wife and I tried to stop him but failed. Two of them raped
my daughter and threatened to shoot us dead on the spot if we disclosed
this incident to anyone. We, the whole family, went through a horrible
92 The Rohingya

experience during that time. After staying there for a couple of months,
out of desperation, one night, we left the place and came to Ukhia and
started living here from 2004. Unfortunately, we were caught here in
the hands of a local goon, who was a politically powerful person. He
gave us shelter in the yard of a house and supported us initially, helping
us get settled there. Within a few days, he came at night and raped my
daughter forcefully by using the same tactics of threat of eviction. We
tried to resist but failed, as we were threatened to be evicted and handed
over to the police. We could not go to the police station, let alone seek
justice from the local leader, or lodge a complaint with any law-enforc-
ing agency because we feared that we would face the same situation all
over again. Staying there for a couple of months, we moved here and
are living in the Taal with other hundreds of thousands of Rohingyas.
After we moved here, the local goon did not dare to come here as many
other Rohingyas are living here and we could seek help from them. My
daughter became mentally ill after going through such terrible experi-
ences. This is the sad story that many Rohingya girls living in Bangladesh
experience in their lifetime.

This case reveals the extreme vulnerability of the Rohingyas in

Bangladesh, though this is not a regular and frequent one. Nonetheless,
it reveals that the state produces extreme vulnerabilities, which are then
exploited by the community and the local-level agents of the state. In
fact, the vulnerability of Rohingya life is the production of the prob-
lematic relations to people’s rights to ‘space’, meaning a geographical
framing of citizenship and legal territoriality of existence. Following
Walton-Roberts’s35 conceptualization of three ways of ‘slippery citizen-
ship’, one could read the conditions of the Rohingyas in a similar light.
She explains, ‘Citizenship is central to the space in which a person is
empowered to exercise rights, and this geographical framing of citizen-
ship is central to the differential rights various subjects can access in all
areas of life.’36 Since the Rohingyas do not have any ‘space’ within the
geographical framing of citizenship in either Bangladesh or Myanmar,
they lead a right-less life, rendering their life miserable and inhuman to
an extreme state of ‘subhuman’ life.

Relations with the Local People

The relationship between the Rohingyas and the local people has
changed over the years, resulting in a crisis of social integration, as
 State of Stateless People 93

discussed in Chapter 3. In the early years, migrant Rohingyas were

received warmly by the local people for humanitarian reasons, as a
symbol of sympathy for their neighbours and due to feelings of Muslim
brotherhood. It is worth mentioning here that ‘both-way conditions’
perfectly matched in the beginning of the influx, which created a conge-
nial and welcoming space for the Rohingyas. By both-way conditions,
I mean a religious connection and mutual responses clicked timely,
which worked as a ‘catalyst’ for the host society to host the ‘guests’ well.
The Rohingyas presented their miseries ‘as the oppression of Buddhist
against the Muslim’37 in Rakhine State. Majority of the people of Ukhia
and Teknaf were predominantly religious and used to lead their lives
following Islamic principles. Therefore, the ‘Muslim’ identity became
the central reason for ‘hosting’ the Rohingyas in Ukhia and Teknaf
in the late eighties. However, it did not last long since, gradually, the
cohesive relations between the locals and the Rohingyas turned into a
conflicting one.
Analysing the case studies and the ethnographic notes I accumulated,
I also described six principal reasons why the brotherly relationship
between the Rohingyas and local Bengalis became confrontational.
These were: (1) the sharing of scarce resources; (2) intolerant resistance
by Bangladeshis against interethnic marriage between the Rohingyas
and Bengalis; (3) Rohingyas’ intervention in a limited local job market;
(4) pressures on the local environment; (5) domestic and international
security issues, and (6) criminal offences reportedly committed by
the Rohingyas. While a glimpse of these six reasons has been given in
Chapter 3, I elaborate on these here with ethnographic details as our
entry point.

Sharing Scarce Resources

The local people, particularly those whom I met and interviewed in
Ukhia and Teknaf, complained to me on various occasions that they
have to share the already insufficient resources with the Rohingyas,
including agricultural crops, farm goods, vegetables, poultry, and
fish. The Rohingyas living in the locality are perceived as an added
burden and competitors for these limited resources. Whenever the
local Bangladeshis fall into any sort of crisis, the presence of the
Rohingyas is made out to be the main cause for it. Faisal Mia (52) is
94 The Rohingya

one of my respondents and a dweller of Pasan Para. He ran a small

tea stall in the Ukhia Bazar. During my fieldwork, I would often sit
on a bench in front of his tea stall and talk to many local people
and villagers. Faisal Mia was very popular for his sense of humour,
and therefore, the local people used to gather at his tea stall and
gossip over tea, cigarettes, and biscuits. His tea stall was a space of
public gathering where he sold tea, cigarettes, toast, bread, biscuits,
bananas, and similar items. Faisal Mia used to blame the Rohingyas
for the various problems that the locals had to face in their everyday
life. In response to a question on their persistent poverty, Faisal Mia
said to me in 2014:
Rohingyas are the main factor responsible for why we remain poor.
The whole of Bangladesh is becoming rich and wealthy, but we remain
at the same level in terms of socio-economic position. The flow of
Rohingya migration has not stopped yet and it goes on. When a big
influx takes place, media comes up with gorom-gorom (hot) stories, but
they migrate to Bangladesh on a continuous basis. They share every-
thing that we have, including food, shelter, resources, and habitat.
You cannot see it with eyes open, but upon considerable thought, you
find that the Rohingyas are the main reason why we cannot develop
ourselves.

Consequently, the locals often point fingers at the Rohingyas for

their many sorts of collective and social problems. The existing prob-
lem has been intensified by the new and massive influx that took place
in 2017.

Elopement, Interethnic Marriage, and the Threat of the ‘Other’

Interethnic marriages between the Rohingyas and Bengalis are another
factor for Bangladeshi reluctance and resistance against the Rohingyas,
something which has been growing rapidly in Ukhia and Teknaf areas
in recent years. As a result of interethnic intimacy, marriages between
local Bengalis and the Rohingyas are very common in Ukhia and
Teknaf. Younger Rohingyas, both girls and boys, become frequently
romantically involved with Bengali youths. This is not a new phenom-
enon and in fact, interethnic marriages have been taking place in these
areas on a regular basis since the Rohingyas first came in 1978. Some
among both Bengalis and Rohingyas interpret this as an attempt by
 State of Stateless People 95

Figure 4.2 Local marketplace in Ukhia where plastic sheets are sold on the
roadside by the local Bengalis
Source: Author’s personal collection.

the Rohingyas to gain legitimacy and an honourable identity among

the local Bengalis.
One of my Rohingya informants, Moriam Khatun (32) who had
an interethnic marriage and had the first hand experience of how it
changed her position in society, explained to me in 2015:
I fell in love with Kabir [a Bengali], got married, and gave birth to three
children. I am now well-settled and treated as one of the Bengali family
members, unlike the treatment I used to receive prior to my marriage.
Before marriage, I was living without any status because the Rohingyas
have no status and identity in the society, neither in Myanmar nor in
Bangladesh, but now I have my own identity, husband, and a family.

After a long interview for the first time in 2015 and six more meet-
ings between 2016 and 2018, I got the feeling that she is happy because
marriage became the means through which she got a socially recog-
nized identity and the status of someone belonging to a household,
even though, as she added, ‘My parents-in-law quite often do not forget
96 The Rohingya

to remind me that I am a Rohingya, meaning a bad girl. I am happy that

I have family, identity, and social status whilst others do not.’ However,
interethnic marriages are still not well accepted and they have a strong
negative connotation that is locally shaped and is considered to be a
‘damage of social image’ and ‘matter of social stigma’ by all the locals
in the society.
On multiple occasions, many of my Bengali informants in Pasan
Para and Vasan Para told me that ‘such marriages are used for emo-
tional exploitation and sexual blackmail by Rohingya women’. Golam
Kuddus (51), a local Bengali who lived in Pasan Para, was the landlord
of extensive cultivable land and employed many people to work on his
land during peak agricultural seasons, expressed his feelings about this
matter, which I recorded in 2014:

Rohingya girls are very shoitan and chalak [evil and cunning]. They emo-
tionally exploit Bengali youths to serve their purpose. They try and catch
one young boy after another so that they can get out of their miseries.
To tell the truth, they do not even have any character. One girl targets
a couple of boys and maintains a regular relation with all of them at
the same time to exploit them, but hides one case from another. Young
Bengali boys hardly understand their tricks. To some extent, the girl
sexually exploits all of them to convince one of them. If somehow one
Bengali boy is convinced, then both of them elope and marry. As parents,
after marriage we have nothing to do but to accept them. You can easily
understand how difficult it is for us to accept a girl of such character as
a daughter-in-law in the family. I do not need to go far as my eldest son
married a Rohingya girl who became our family member. So, what I am
telling you is my lived experience. Considering my family conditions as
my elder son did it, I had to accept her but unfortunately she could not
adjust in the family. She left my house, taking my elder son away. Now
they live in a separate household. I gave birth to my son, took care of
him, nurtured him to grow up, spent money-energy-time-care to educate
him, but he has severed his ties with us now. This is how the Rohingya
girls are breaking our family ties and kinship bondage.

Golam Kuddus’s statement seems distasteful, but during my field-

work, I found that many local people hold this attitude towards the
Rohingyas and interethnic marriage between the Rohingyas and
Bengalis. These kinds of events—love, elopement, and marriage—
significantly contribute to increased distance between the Rohingyas
 State of Stateless People 97

and the local Bengalis, and thus, they are subject to deep resentment by
many local Bengalis.

A Lopsided View of the Job Market

Growing unemployment among the locals has also become an acute
issue of contention, since the Rohingyas, who came in 1978, 1991/1992,
2012, 2015, and 2016, have entered an already limited job market. Day
labour, small-scale construction work, agriculture, carpentry, weaving,
handicraft, dry fish business, fishing at the seashore, boat fishing, mak-
ing fishing nets, small-scale cottage industry, rickshaw pulling, work-
ing in brick fields, and wood chopping are some of the sectors where
the local people of Teknaf and Ukhia are largely employed. After the
arrival of more than 750,000 Rohingyas, the local occupational setting
has drastically collapsed because they occupied lands, hills, schools,
madrasas, community centres, and all accessible open spaces in Ukhia
and Teknaf. However, even before the new arrivals, the Rohingyas who
came earlier used to sell their labour at lower rates compared to the
locals in the aforementioned sectors of the job market and, hence, were
preferred by the employers. Hossain Kabir (54), a local Bengali and
also a day labourer in Vasan Para, told me:
Our rate of day work is 300–350 Bangladesh Taka (BDT) with a meal
at lunch. We work in construction sites, boat fishing, agricultural fields,
weaving, small-scale cottage industry, and the like. Everywhere, we sell
our labour on a daily basis and we earn 300–350 BDT. The Rohingyas sell
their day labour much cheaper than we do, at rates which range from 50
to 150 BDT. Therefore, employers employ them instead of us due to their
cheap labour. We cannot sell our day labour at 150 BDT, and employers
are not ready to pay 300 BDT. In this way, the Rohingyas are occupy-
ing our job market gradually and we are becoming jobless and workless.
They are capturing our meals. You tell us how would you tolerate those
who snatch away your meals.

That the Rohingyas are being forced to work way below the mini-
mum wages is seen as an invasive threat by the Bangladeshi locals. For
the Rohingyas, this barter of dignity, labour power, and labour time
becomes their only means of survival. What does not feature in this
critique of the refugees’ perceived threat is the role played by the small-
scale businesses owned by Bangladeshis. Profit seeking and cost cutting
98 The Rohingya

enables and encourages many Bangladeshi business owners to employ

cheaper labour. One finds that an informed political understanding of
minimum wages, labour time, and wage gap gives way and precedence
to the mere naming and shaming of the Rohingya refugees. This lens
of understanding could be found in some narratives of the Rohingyas,
many of which I recorded during my fieldwork in Ukhia and Teknaf.
Kabir Mian (47) is a Rohingya who came to Bangladesh in 1991 and
has been living in Leda camps ever since. He was a professional day
labourer who used to sell his labour on a daily basis. He told me in
2014 that the Rohingyas work for low wages because of their situation
and the dynamics of the rhetoric of job market occupation. He said:

If we do not sell our labour cheaper than the locals, why will other people,
who themselves are locals, employ us? We take what is offered since we
do not have the bargaining power. In fact, getting a job is more important
than how much we earn because we have to survive, our family members
included, at all costs. Are we to die of starvation?

Predictably, the same facts are interpreted from two different per-
spectives depending on the context. Rohingyas seeking jobs is ‘an undue
penetration’ to the local Bengalis, but it is one of the many ‘survival
strategies’ for the unregistered Rohingyas living in Ukhia and Teknaf.

The Alleged Damage to Local Ecology

Another important reason behind the mushrooming negative attitudes
towards the Rohingyas in Bangladesh is the environmental pollution
allegedly brought about by them. It has become a popular public
perception in Bangladesh that ‘the Rohingya people are damaging the
local ecological settings’.38 ‘As a strategy to settle down in Bangladesh,
the Rohingya people who have been allegedly encroaching in the for-
est have attempted to make matrimonial alliance and kinship with
local encroachers and villagers within or nearby forests [sic].’39 The
Rohingyas are said to have engaged in illegal felling, hunting, and fuel
wood collection, which is largely destroying the local environmental
setting in Ukhia and Teknaf. According to a study ‘the Teknaf range had
almost 100 per cent forest cover in 1980. By 1990, it had dropped to
55 per cent. Current data show [that] only 8 per cent of natural forest
cover remains in Teknaf Wildlife Sanctuary or TWS (Nishorgo Support
 State of Stateless People 99

Programme [NSP] 2006). At least 92 per cent forest area of TWS and the
habitat of wildlife have disappeared during the last 25 years.’40 While
the Rohingyas are held responsible for these changes, the role of other
local activities and the possible involvement of Bangladeshi locals,
climate change, and the impact of environmental policy over these
years remains understudied and needs equal attention. Just pointing
fingers at the Rohingyas has become a common practice in Ukhia and
Teknaf whenever the question of environmental pollution comes up.
One day, one of my key Rohingya informants, Harun Majhi (61), dur-
ing my 2016 visit, said to me in jest, ‘Why is Dhaka one of the highest
ranked places in the world in terms of environmental pollution, where
no Rohingya lives? So, the presence of the Rohingyas is not the main
reason for environmental pollution in Ukhia and Teknaf. Many local
people are cutting forests, trees, and jungles and selling it in the market
as firewood, but they accuse only the Rohingyas for deforestation.’
After the massive influx in 2016–18, an impact on the local envi-
ronmental setting has become a great concern at the policy level.41 The
allegations are that the Rohingyas are involved in illegal wood logging
and trafficking, destroying the forest resources by using firewood for
cooking, using open spaces for urination and defecation, building
temporary shelters by cutting forests, and ‘living on forest resources
which they use unsustainably by damaging the natural resources for
the near future’.42 Against these accusations, the Rohingyas have their
own explanation, unlike Harun Majhi who made a problematic com-
ment. Kalimulla (50), one of my Rohingya informants, who came to
Bangladesh in 1978 but was sent back as part of the repatriation process
following an agreement between Bangladesh and Burma with the help
of UNHCR. However, he returned to Bangladesh since the situation in
Rakhine State remained unchanged. Since then, he has been living in
Ukhia. I had many fruitful discussions with him over the years. One
day, I was talking to him about the issue of environmental pollution
created by the Rohingyas, and he responded (as recorded in 2014):
What can I possibly do for our survival other than using the natural
resources around us? Where will I go with my family members—my
wife, three daughters, and two sons—if I do not make some space for liv-
ing in this jungle? The GoB does not recognize us as refugees. Therefore,
the UNHCR does not provide us with food or any other assistance. Even
NGOs do not provide us with any assistance. We cannot go back to
100 The Rohingya

Myanmar since the junta does not recognize us as Myanmar’s citizens

and Rakhine’s situation is worsening as far, we know. Myanmar’s Rakhine
Buddhists are always ready to kill us there. Where will we go? How will
we survive? Is our fault that we were born in this world?

He explained in detail the miserable conditions in which he and his

seven family members lived. This resonates with the plight of many
Rohingyas in Bangladesh. In fact, their statelessness has created these
vulnerabilities and uncertainties in the life of Rohingyas, since neither
Bangladesh nor Myanmar accepts them as citizens, thereby denying
them their basic human rights of food, clothing, shelter, medical care,
and education. However, it can definitely be said that the alleged ‘rep-
resentation of [the] Rohingyas as destroyers of local ecological settings
and huge environment denigration’ is contributing to the worsening
relations between the local Bengalis and the Rohingyas.
Even the local media is heavily biased in its approach and regularly
publishes on environmental pollution, damage to local ecological set-
tings, and deforestation, ‘allegedly’ due to the excessive use and con-
tinuous destruction by the Rohingya refugees. Many environmentalists,
geographers, and researchers are regularly fuelling this flame.

Militant Activities
The Rohingyas are allegedly involved in different militant activities
in Bangladesh. Even the sensational Ramu incidents43 that took place
in 2012 were said to have been orchestrated by the Rohingya.44 Many
Arakanese rival groups, namely ARSA, Rohingya Solidarity Organisation
(RSO), Arakan Liberation Party (ALP), and National United Party of
Arakan (NUPA), are said to have tried to build networks and link-
ages with some radical groups in Bangladesh.45 They have reportedly
established their training camps in the jungles of Teknaf and Ukhia
and the nearby region, the Chittagong Hill Tracts, to use this region
as a safe passage for arms trafficking. Many national and international
media reports claim that this Rohingya crisis will destabilize the South
and Southeast Asian states in terms of national and regional security
issues.46 However, Pasan Para and Vasan Para did not have any visible
presence of such radical and militant activism.
Local Bengalis suspect that many Rohingyas are actively involved in
militant activities. Hussain Mia, a local Bengali living in Pasan Para,
 State of Stateless People 101

who is involved in politics and holds a post in the local committee of a

central political organization, once told me in 2016:
It is not unlikely that many of them are involved in militant activities,
because the way they were tortured, exploited, and killed in Myanmar,
they could have formed a militant group to take revenge. It will become
a problem if any Bangladeshi militant group uses this space for the
implementation of local agendas. It is also not beyond doubt that many
local militant groups, particularly some Islamist political parties, are get-
ting in touch with them, supporting them, and using the space of their
vulnerable conditions, which could be dangerous to the local security
issues. The most important thing is if they become involved in inter-
national Islamist groups like ISIS and Al-Qaeda; then it would be truly
hazardous.

I found similar sentiments among many local Bengalis who hold

definite suspicions that some Rohingyas are involved in local militant
activities. In different news dailies, time and again, one finds reports
of Rohingyas being alleged members of Islamist militant groups in
this region, which is regarded as a serious security threat by the GoB.
Following the 2017 influx, on suspicions of a potential connection with
some of the Islamist groups, the relief and aid activities of three NGOs
were halted by the home ministry of Bangladesh.47 Very recently, 41
more NGOs were ordered to stop their relief activities in Ukhia and
Teknaf refugee camps. The GoB will not allow them to work in the
refugee camps with any new project and programme48 based on intel-
ligence reports of their activities against Rohingya repatriation. They
are trying, as a government officer from Teknaf said on condition of
anonymity, to ‘catch the fishes in the grey water’.49
Meanwhile, Bangladeshi intelligence forces have arrested and
detained many Rohingyas, claiming that they are actively involved
with militant Islamist groups.50 Actual and supposed involvement of
the Rohingyas in militant activism is another instrumental factor in
shaping the structure of relations between the state of Bangladesh, the
Rohingyas, and the locals. It could be easily assumed that their lack of
citizenship and their sense of deprivation as stateless people are part of
the reason why some Rohingyas may become militants or get driven to
drastic measures in desperate times.
Amartya Sen51 argues that citizenship is integrally connected with
the enhancement of human capabilities, and therefore, the granting
102 The Rohingya

of citizenship removes some of the ‘unfreedoms’ that place people

at risk from want and fear. We see this resonating in the case of the
Rohingyas as non-citizens, and thereby a stateless people, without a
home, driven by state to a permanent state of exception. There seems
to be no state with the political will to recognize their right to have
rights, rendering their life subhuman and vulnerable to exploitation
and rejection.

***

Based on this discussion and analysis of the structure of relations

between the state, local people, and the Rohingyas, we see that the role
of Bangladesh in handling the Rohingyas is influenced by some key
trends. First, as a non-signatory state of the 1951 Refugee Convention,
Bangladesh legally absolves itself from the obligation of hosting refu-
gees in its territory as per the Convention. Already driven to an absolute
state of exception, the Rohingyas remain claimless, without access to
law and order or protection, and bearing no rights.
Given Bangladesh’s own underdeveloped and resource-poor iden-
tity, battling with problems of hunger in a population of over 160 mil-
lion, extreme poverty, and looming Islamic radicalism in the country,
the massive presence of more than 1,300,000 Rohingyas is seen and
experienced as an added burden on its limited resources, marked by
constant strife and tension. Historically, Bangladesh has not had cordial
diplomatic, bilateral, or trade relations with Myanmar. Bangladesh’s
border is frequently used for illegal trade, smuggling, and human traf-
ficking by Myanmar-based groups. Therefore, there is always a sort of
border tension between the two neighbouring countries. Next, many of
Myanmar’s so-called terrorist groups are said to have been active inside
the Bangladesh territory and use it as a safe passage for arms trafficking.52
It is also widely discussed that such practices promote militant activi-
ties inside Bangladesh, which is regarded as a serious security threat for
the country, not to deny the presence of home-grown militant groups
in Bangladesh.53 In the security make-up of the region, Myanmar is
constructed as an ‘unsafe other’, as a security threat to Bangladesh, and
the Rohingyas are thus seen as an extension of this threat.
Despite the condition of the relationship between the two countries,
the Rohingyas deserve to be treated as human beings with dignity and
 State of Stateless People 103

rights, a life as accorded by international and national judicial and

legal frameworks.54 Myanmar’s policies first rendered them stateless
and later forced them to flee their homeland, rendering them refugees.
When they were compelled to cross the border, Bangladesh regarded
them as illegal migrants and an economic burden.
Driven to be a stateless, placeless people in transit, where are they
to go? How will they survive? As human beings, they also have the
right to citizenship, one of the most basic human rights endorsed by
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Rohingya issue must
therefore be seen as a question of basic deprivation of rights, espe-
cially the individual right to citizenship endorsed by international
law and jurisprudence. In that context, apart from what is going on
in Myanmar, human rights violations are taking place, atrocities are
being committed, basic human needs are still left unfulfilled and
essential human necessities are unmet, particularly for unregistered
Rohingyas in Bangladesh. Bangladesh is now serving the in-camp
Rohingya refugees living in both permanent and temporary refugee
camps built in Ukhia and Teknaf, until the last influx, through the
active support of UNHCR, IOM, and its local and international part-
ners, while the larger number of out-camp Rohingyas are left unas-
sisted, unsupported, and uncounted in the state’s policy, projects, and
state’s plan for rehabilitation or lawful repatriation through bilateral
contact with Myanmar. These unregistered Rohingyas try to integrate
with the local population, which creates tension and conflict in local
societal dynamism, for example, crisis in the local job market, burden
on scarce resources, interethnic marriages, threat to the law and order
situation in the locality, and so on. Consequently, the social distance
between the local people and the Rohingyas is gradually increas-
ing. Therefore, the Rohingya refugee issue needs urgent attention
to resolve it within the framework of individual rights and entitle-
ments as human beings, as endorsed by international jurisprudence
ratified by the UN. As member countries of the UN, Bangladesh and
Myanmar should also be brought under the legal obligation of the
UN charter in an attempt to save the Rohingyas and, in the end, to
uphold the spirit of humanity. However, this book takes the issue
further by arguing that the entire Rohingya crisis is not only a crisis
of statelessness, non-citizenship, and violation of human rights, but
involves the nature of the state and the state’s policy towards people
104 The Rohingya

of cultural, racial, and religious difference, which makes others treat

them as ‘subhuman’.

Notes
1. United Nations General Assembly, Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, Article 15(1), New York (1948).
2. See Kristy Belton, ‘Statelessness: A Matter of Human Rights,’ in The
Human Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept, ed. Rhoda Howard-Hassmann
and Margaret Walton-Roberts (Pennsylvania: The University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015), 31–44.
3. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Convention Related to
Status of Stateless People, Article 1(1), Geneva (1954).
4. Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt Books,
1994).
5. David Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of Non-citizens (USA: Oxford
University Press, 2008).
6. Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, trans. by
D. Heller-Roazen (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998).
7. Margaret Walton-Roberts. ‘Slippery Citizenship and Retrenching Rights’,
in The Human Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept, ed. Rhoda Howard-
Hassmann; and Margaret Walton-Roberts (Pennsylvania: The University of
Pennsylvania Press, 2015), 242.
8. Bangladesh is neither a signatory to the 1951 Convention relating to
the Status of Refugees nor to its 1967 Protocol and has not enacted any
national legislation on asylum and refugee matters … [but] Bangladesh
has acceded to several of the existing international rights, Covenants and
Conventions and have provisions within its Constitution that uphold
the rights and duties within the UN Charter and further safeguard the
legal protection of non-citizens within its territory.

See Pia Prytz Phiri, ‘Rohingyas and Refugee Status in Bangladesh’, Forced
Migration Review (2008): 1, accessed 22 March 2013, https://www.fmreview.
org/burma/phiri.
9. At that time, the Rohingyas who migrated to Bangladesh were widely
regarded as ‘refugees’, but now Bangladesh is very diplomatic in using the ter-
minology to indicate the Rohingyas living within its boundary. During the late
1970s and early 1990s, the Rohingyas were regarded as ‘refugees’, hence I am
also using the word ‘refugee’ here.
10. The Rohingyas used to live in sheds in the two camps. The GoB super-
vised the process of building these sheds funded by UNHCR. There are 852
 State of Stateless People 105

sheds in the two camps where 5,112 families are accommodated, since each
shed contains 6 families. Information obtained during a field visit in June 2011.
11. Kristy Crabtree, ‘Economic Challenges and Coping Mechanisms in
Protracted Displacement: A Case Study of the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’
Journal of Muslim Mental Health 5, no. 1 (2010): 42.
12. See Imtiaz Ahmed, ed., The Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas (Dhaka:
University Press Limited, 2010).
13. Delwar Hossain and Faridul Alam, ‘Response of the State,’ in The Plight
of the Stateless Rohingyas, ed. Imtiaz Ahmed (Dhaka: University Press Limited,
2010), 89.
14. Chris Lewa, Unregistered Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Crackdown,
Forced Displacement and Hunger (Bangkok: The Arakan Project, 2010), 2.
15. Here, it needs to be made clear that when I talk about ‘registered’ and
‘unregistered’ Rohingyas, I mean the time before the biometric registration was
done. In fact, following the massive influx in 2017, the GoB has taken the initia-
tive to bring all the Rohingyas living in Bangladesh, both new arrivals and the
old ones, under a registered database so that the planned repatriation can be
done smoothly. Besides, there was a mounting demand from the civil society,
human rights organizations, media, and left-leaning political organizations
to prepare a complete list of how many Rohingyas indeed live in Bangladesh.
Considering everything, the GoB has made a biometric database of more than
one million Rohingyas, and the registration process is still going on. However,
my field-level experience says something else. I have found many Rohingyas
escaping the registration process in the fear that soon after registration, they
might be sent back to Myanmar. However, authorities claim that without regis-
tration, nobody will receive any help and support, and hence, everybody must
register if they want to survive.
16. I have provided some ethnographic evidences with first-hand nar-
ratives of the victims in the later part of the chapter. Also, some cases of
physical torture have been stated in some relevant contexts in Chapters 5, 6,
and 7.
17. Carl Grundy-Warr and Elaine Wong, ‘Sanctuary under Plastic Sheet: The
Unresolved Problem of Rohingya Refugees,’ IBRU Boundary and Security Bulletin,
(1997): 87, accessed 2 October 2018, http://www.mcrg.ac.in/WC_2015/
Reading/D_Unresolved_Problem_Rohingya_Refugees.pdf.
18. See Wael Mahdi, ‘The Rohingya’s Lives in Limbo,’ National, 9 June
2009, accessed 25 September 2018, https://www.thenational.ae/world/mena/
the-rohingya-s-lives-in-limbo-1.490350.
19. Ruma Paul and Yi-Mou Lee, ‘Bangladesh Agrees with Myanmar
to Complete the Rohingya Return in Two Years,’ Reuters, 16 January
2018, accessed 10 October 2018, https://www.reuters.com/article/
106 The Rohingya

us-myanmar-rohingya-bangladesh/bangladesh-agrees-with-myanmar-to-com-
plete-rohingya-return-in-two-years-idUSKBN1F50I2.
20. A. Taib Ahmed, ‘Rohingyas Organise against Repatriation before
Recognition,’ Daily Pothom-Alo, 28 February 2018, accessed 2 October 2018,
https://en.prothomalo.com/bangladesh/news/171735/Rohingyas-organise-
against-repatriation-before.
21. Maaz Hussain, ‘Rohingyas Say They Won’t Return to Myanmar Now,’
Voice of America, 6 March 2018, accessed 2 October 2018, https://www.voanews.
com/a/rohingya-fear-repatriation-is-unsafe/4282273.html.
22. United Nations News, ‘UN Agencies and Myanmar Lay Groundwork for
Possible Rohingya Return,’ 1 June 2018, accessed 2 October 2018, https://news.
un.org/en/story/2018/06/1011171.
23. See Zeba Siddiqui, ‘Exclusive: Rohingya Refugee Leaders Draw Up Demands
Ahead of Repatriation,’ Reuters, 19 January 2018, accessed 6 April 2018, https://
www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-rohingya-petition-exclusive/exclusive-
rohingya-refugee-leaders-draw-up-demands-ahead-of-repatriation-idUSK-
BN1F80SE; Michael Safi, ‘“We Cannot Go Back”: Grim Future Facing Rohingya
One Year after Attacks,’ Guardian, 25 August 2018, accessed 27 September 2018,
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/aug/24/rohingya-
one-year-after-attacks
24. Phiri, ‘Rohingyas and Refugee Status in Bangladesh’, 1.
25. For details, see Misha Hussain, ‘For Rohingya in Bangladesh, No Place Is
Home,’ Times, 19 February 2010, accessed 1 August 2012, http://www.time.com/
time/world/article/0,8599,1966621,00.html.
26. I have deliberately used pseudonyms for the informants so that they
do not face harassment from any quarter for their contribution to my research.
Besides, I have included their age along with the name, so that the context of the
event can be clearly understood.
27. Making and repairing fishing nets is a common job that the Rohingyas
do at home. After every fishing trip in the Bay of Bengal, most of the fishing nets
get torn and the Rohingyas repair them at very cheap rates.
28. The RAB is an elite anti-crime and anti-terrorism unit of the Bangladesh
Police.
29. Naf is a river marking the border of Bangladesh and Myanmar.
30. The Myanmar border security force is called Nasaka.
31. See also Cresa L. Pugh, ‘Is Citizenship the Answer? Construction of
Belonging and Exclusion for the Stateless Rohingya of Burma’ (Working Paper
No. 107, International Migration Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford, 2013).
32. Matthew Gibney, Statelessness and the Right to Citizenship (Oxford:
Refugee Study Center, University of Oxford, 2006), 50.
33. See Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism.
 State of Stateless People 107

34. By ‘known means of information’, I mean that the media news items
and reports of international human rights organizations are the only sources
of information about the Rohingyas. In fact, we hardly have any information
about what is happening in the life of the Rohingyas unless it is published in
newspapers. There are many things that happened in the lives of the Rohingyas
before the huge media and global attention they got in 2017.
35. Walton-Roberts, ‘Slippery Citizenship and Retrenching Rights’.
36. Walton-Roberts, ‘Slippery Citizenship and Retrenching Rights,’ 4.
37. In fact, not only in 1978, even now the Rohingyas often tend to present
the critical conditions in Rakhine State as a result of the religious intolerance of
Rakhine Buddhists. The Rohingyas often present the reason for their migration
as the fact that ‘they are Muslims’. However, the newly arrived Rohingyas also
accuse the Myanmar security forces along with the Rakhine Buddhists.
38. See M.Z. Rahman, ‘Livelihoods of Rohingyas and Their Impacts on
Deforestation,’ in Deforestation in the Teknaf Peninsula of Bangladesh, eds. M. Tani
and M. Rahman (Singapore: Springer, 2018), 113–25.
39. Mohammad Khan, Salim Uddin, and Emdad C. Haque, ‘Rural Livelihood
among the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh and Their Impacts on Forests: A
Case of the Teknaf Wildlife Sanctuary,’ in To Host or To Hurt: Counter-Narratives
on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh, ed. Nasir Uddin. (Dhaka: Institute of
Culture and Development Research (ICDR), 2012), 102.
40. Khan, Uddin, and Haque, ‘Rural Livelihood among the Rohingya
Refugees in Bangladesh and Their Impacts on Forests,’ 102–3.
41. A joint study on the environmental impact of Rohingya influx, by the
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and UN Women, with
support from the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change of
Bangladesh, was unveiled on 18 September 2018, where it has been stated that
the policy makers of the GoB have been seriously concerned about the potential
environment impact of the Rohingya settlements in Ukhia and Teknaf. ‘Report
on Environmental Impact of Rohingya Influx,’ United Nations Development
Programme, accessed 29 September 2018, http://www.bd.undp.org/content/
dam/bangladesh/docs/Reports/Summary%20of%20Environmental%20
Impact%20of%20Refugee%20Influx.pdf.
42. Mohammed Selim Uddin and Mohammed Abu Arfin Khan, Comparing
the Impact of Local People and Rohingya Refugees on Teknaf Game Forest (USA:
East-West Center, 2010).
43. A renowned Buddhist temple in Ramu of Cox’s Bazar was vandalized
by some miscreants, which triggered massive media attention as a symbol
of religious intolerance and communal violence. See, for details, Harun ur
Rashid, ‘Ramu Violence: International Implication,’ Daily Star, 10 October 2012,
accessed 20 January 2018, https://www.thedailystar.net/news-detail-253124.
108 The Rohingya

44. For details, see Jyotirmoy Barua, ed., Ramu: A Collection of Communal
Violence (in Bengali) (Dhaka: Drik, 2013).
45. Mayesha Alam, ‘How the Rohingya Crisis Is Affecting Bangladesh—
and Why It Matters,’ Washington Post, 12 February 2018, accessed 3 October
2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/02/12/
how-the-rohingya-crisis-is-affecting-bangladesh-and-why-it-matters/
?noredirect=on&utm_term=.4c94f3da6667; Didier Chaudet, ‘The Rohingya
Crisis: Impact and Consequences for South Asia,’ The Journal of Current Affairs 2,
no. 2 (2018): 1–17; Nyshka Chandran, ‘Terror Groups May Take Advantage of
Myanmar's Rohingya Crisis,’ CNBC, 13 September 2017, accessed 4 October 2018,
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/13/myanmar-rohingya-crisis-islamic-terror-
groups-may-take-advantage.html.
46. ‘It Can Destabilise the Entire South Asia,’ Daily Star, 7 October 2017,
accessed 4 October 2018, https://www.thedailystar.net/backpage/it-can-destabi-
lise-entire-south-asia-1472773; Mayesha Alam, ‘5 Things You Need To Know
about the Rohingya Crisis—And How It Could Roil Southeast Asia,’ Washington
Post, 14 September 2017, accessed 20 January 2018, https://www.washington-
post.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/09/14/5-things-you-need-to-know-
about-rohingya-crisis-and-how-it-could-roil-southeast-asia/?utm_term=.
cd5044ac1d04; Step Vaessen, ‘Rohingya Crisis: A Threat to Stability in Southeast
Asia,’ Al Jazeera, 10 September 2017, accessed 4 October 2018, https://www.
aljazeera.com/blogs/asia/2017/09/rohingya-crisis-threat-stability-southeast-
asia-170910173120308.html.
47. See ‘3 NGOs Barred from Relief Works for Rohingyas,’ Daily Star,
1 October 2017, accessed 20 January 2018, https://www.thedailystar.net/
myanmar-rohingya-crisis/three-ngo-barred-relief-works-rohingyas-cox-bazar-
bangladesh-1475002.
48. Muktadir Rashid, ‘Restriction of 41 NGOs Irk Development Workers,’
Daily New Age, 27 August 2018, accessed 10 October 2018, http://www.new-
agebd.net/article/49253/restrictions-on-41-ngos-irk-development-workers.
49. ‘Catching fishes in the grey water’ is a very popular proverb in Bangladesh.
It means there are some people who are always busy trying to make profit even
in a crisis situation. Some government officers and some local Bengalis think
that there are some NGOs who are trying to make money from the plight of the
Rohingyas.
50. ‘“Several” Suspected Rohingya Insurgents in Custody: Bangladesh
Official,’ Radio Free Asia, 18 April 2018, accessed 10 October 2018, https://www.
rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/bangladesh-arrests-04182018161609.html.
51. Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2001).
 State of Stateless People 109

52. See, for details, Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People
in the Struggle for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b).
53. The Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO) is allegedly involved with
militant activities. In 2009 and 2011, the Bangladesh security forces and law
enforcement agencies found a large number of arms, guerrilla fighters, and
destructive weapons in the deep forests of Ukhia and Bandarban hill district.
For details, see Mahfuzul Chowdhury and Nasir Uddin, ‘Of Hurting and
Hosting: Crises in Co-existence with Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh,’ in To
Host or To Hurt: Counter-Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh, ed.
Nasir Uddin (Dhaka: Institute of Culture and Development Research [ICDR],
2012a), 31–46.
54. See also Abdullah Al-Faruque, ‘Plight of Rohingya Refugees in
Bangladesh: Legal Aspects of the Problem,’ in To Host or To Hurt: Counter-
Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh, ed. Nasir Uddin (Dhaka:
Institute of Culture and Development Research [ICDR], 2012), 65–80.
 The (Re)production

5 of Vulnerability
State in Everyday Life of Stateless Rohingyas

T here are more than twelve million people in the world, including
the Rohingyas who are stateless,1 without a state’s recognition
of citizenship to them. The question of citizens and non-citizens
determines peoples’ inclusion and exclusion in the legal framework
of the modern nation state.2 In fact, some people are rendered legal
objects instead of human subjects in the world mainly due to the
constitutional endorsement of citizens and non-citizens. The modern
nation state system has thus solidified the concept of citizenship and
non-citizenship, though the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(1948) ensures that ‘everyone has the right to a nationality’.3 As non-
citizens are legally stateless, they also become rights-less people as
being a citizen involves rights and entitlements along with duties and
obligations, since ‘citizenship is a reciprocal relationship of rights and
duties between individuals and states’.4 Given the context, the state of
statelessness confirms the conditions of rights-lessness though ‘human
rights are also conferred to non-citizens’,5 even if procedurally, by the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In the state’s legal framework,
the stateless are considered ‘illegal bodies’ who are subjected to atrocities
and even persecution amid various forms of vulnerabilities within
the state’s structures. It denotes that vulnerability is produced and
reproduced by the state itself via its frequent intervention in the lives
of stateless people. This chapter focuses on the Rohingyas’ experience,
as stateless people and non-citizens, of state’s penetration in their
The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 111

everyday life, which results in severe atrocities and dreadful injustice

through (re)production of vulnerability.
In Bangladesh, the Rohingyas generally held the status of registered
refugees and unregistered illegal migrants until the new influx of 2017, but
as per the newest official articulation they have been given the status of
forcibly displaced Myanmar nationals (FDMN).6 Those who are ‘officially
registered’ and live in ‘official’ camps under the supervision of the UNHCR
are ‘Rohingya refugees’, while the rest who are not officially registered
and live either in makeshift camps or in other localities are known as
‘illegal migrants’. It was factually true until the new influx took place in
2017 and onwards, but now they, both old ones and new arrivals, have
a new identity as ‘FDMN’. Local Bengalis call them Bormaya7 (Burmese
people) as they migrated from Borma. In the framework of the modern
nation state, the Rohingyas are non-existent human beings as they are
nowhere in the legal framework of either Bangladesh or Myanmar.
Therefore, the Rohingyas experience persecution, atrocities, and everyday
forms of discrimination committed by the state despite their stateless
identity. This chapter, with the case of Rohingyas, explains how the lives
of stateless people are shaped, regulated, and controlled by the state due
to their lack of citizenship, in the form of what Michel Foucault calls
‘bio-politics’8 as a form of controlling/regulating ‘bodies’ and Elizabeth
Povinelli9 calls ‘geontologies’10 as a form of controlling people through a
mechanism of power. With empirically and ethnographically11 informed
analysis, the chapter argues that even if the lack of citizenship renders
people stateless, the state continues to regulate their everyday life in order
to perpetuate their condition of ‘statelessness’ by making them objects
of differential treatment, and thereby committing severe injustices and
violations of human rights. Along with my earlier year-long fieldwork,
based on the empirical evidences recorded among the traumatized
Rohingyas who fled persecution to cross the border to Bangladesh fol-
lowing 25 August 2017 when a massive campaign took place against the
civilian Rohingyas in Rakhine State, this chapter argues that vulnerability
is indeed produced and reproduced by the state itself.

Vulnerability and the State in Myanmar

Vulnerability is a particular state of being that consists of uncertainty,
insecurity, and the possibility of being harmed—in various ways such as
112 The Rohingya

deadly attack, violence, killing, and even elimination and extermination

from social, political, and physical spaces—in a hostile environment
created by the state in most cases. The reason why the Rohingyas
have crossed the border into Bangladesh is due to an extreme form
of vulnerability created by the state of Myanmar, explained in part in
previous chapters, which backtracks ‘the vulnerable theory’ of Martha
Fineman.12 Fineman underscores the role of the state as a political
institution for the reduction of vulnerability and the assurance of
equity and equality in the society. Since human beings inherit vulner-
ability, Fineman strongly stands for the state to take up the issue of
vulnerability to redress it effectively so that social justice and social
services for all are confirmed in the society. According to her theory,
‘vulnerability is inherent to the human condition, and that govern-
ments therefore have a responsibility to respond affirmatively to that
vulnerability by ensuring that all people have equal access to the
societal institutions that distribute resources. The theory thus provides
an alternative basis for defining the role of government and a justifi-
cation for expansive social welfare policies.’13 However, my first-hand
experience of doing ethnographic fieldwork among the Rohingya
refugees in Ukhia and Teknaf reveals a clear departure from the theo-
retical position of Fineman. In the case of the Rohingyas, the state
of Myanmar has produced and reproduced fearful living conditions
in Rakhine State, making the Rohingyas extremely vulnerable and
compelling them to flee to Bangladesh to escape persecution. I would
prefer to bring in the idea of ‘state crime’, framed by Penny Green
and Tony Ward,14 to understand the roles of the state in the generation and
reproduction of vulnerability because both argued that ‘state crimes’
are deviant or illegal activities perpetrated by the state to implement its
policy and achieve its goal, even violating human rights. Judith Butler’s15
idea of ‘precarious life’ is also befitting for a better understanding
of the production and reproduction of Rohingyas’ vulnerabilities.
Butler conceptualized ‘precarious life’, explaining that ‘[such life]
considers the political implications of those normative conceptions
of the human that produce, through an exclusionary process, a host
of “unlivable lives” whose legal and political status is suspended.’16
The life experiences of the Rohingyas whom I interviewed are indeed
more than ‘precarious’ because along with the suspension of their
legal and political life, they are considered worthy of extinction, what
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 113

Isabell Lorey calls ‘the state of insecurity’.17 Lorey has further clarified
the ‘precarious life’ in the form of the state of insecurity, explaining
that ‘precarization means … more than the lack of security.… By way
of insecurity and danger it embraces the whole of existence, the body,
modes of subjectivation. It is threat and coercion.… Precarization
means living with the unforeseeable, with contingency.’18 Therefore,
what the Rohingyas have been experiencing in Rakhine State is more
than a ‘precarious life’. The Rohingya narratives stated in this chapter
confirm two interconnected proven facts: First, Myanmar, as a state,
has created extremely unliveable conditions—what I have called ‘atro-
cious living conditions’—that have pushed the Rohingyas to the state
of vulnerability. It unfolds that the Rohingya vulnerability is basically
a state-created ‘state of being’ because Myanmar is deliberately imple-
menting a policy that the former UN High Commissioner for Human
Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said is the ‘textbook example of ethnic
cleaning’19 and some called it ‘genocide’.20 Second, the way in which
the Myanmar security forces and Buddhist fundamentalists treated the
Rohingyas, which is reflected in the narratives of many Rohingyas I
interviewed during my fieldwork, as if their lives are worthy of extinc-
tion, denotes an extreme form of vulnerability.

Migration, Local Acceptance, and the Reversal

of Relations
Migration trends and patterns are multifaceted, but transborder
movement does not always mean migration from one country to
another only in search of economic fortunes.21 Increasing number of
refugees and asylum seekers across the world in the twenty-first century
indicate that the states are gradually becoming intolerant towards
people from different cultural, religious, and racial backgrounds. To
some extent, state policies are framed in a way that makes the socio-
economic-political setting of a country unliveable for those people
who are excluded in the framework of majoritarian statehood and
a unilinear nationhood. The Rohingyas are the victims of such a
‘majoritarian statehood’ (a state for Burmese people) and ‘unilinear
nationhood’ (a state for Bamar nationals)22 in Myanmar.
Soon after the Rohingya became stateless even in Myanmar, which
they believe is their nation state, they started migrating to other
114 The Rohingya

countries to escape persecution, though large-scale migration started

in 1978 to flee Operation Nagamin (see Chapters 2 and 3). Based on
my long years of research engagement with the Rohingyas, I found
that, among other nations, they migrated to Bangladesh due to three
reasons: First, Bangladesh is an immediate neighbouring country,
and therefore, the Rohingyas had easy access to it. It has been found
in the literature of refugee studies23 that when any atrocious situa-
tion created in a particular state forces people to leave the country,
the people immediately cross the nearest border. Second, there is a
linguistic similarity with the people of south-eastern Bangladesh,
being Muslims and speaking in the Chittagonian language. What I
mean by linguistic similarity needs clarification. Arakan, the former
name of Rakhine State, and the southern part of present Chittagong,
once belonged to the same geographic region and there was no border
between Arakan and this part of Bengal. Therefore, there was regular
contact between the people of Bengal and Arakan. Amid such free flow
of interaction, the Rohingya language accommodated a lot of words
from the Chittagonian dialect, which is a regional dialect of Bengali.
Though the Rohingya language constitutes of vocabulary from vari-
ous languages including Arabic, Urdu, Persian, Turkish, and Burmese
due to interaction with different nations at various points during the
history of Arakan,24 Bengali vocabulary and sentence-making pat-
tern formed a significant part of Rohingya language because of their
intimate interaction over the centuries. The third reason behind the
Rohingya migration to Bangladesh is their religious affinity. The con-
sistent persecution of the Rohingyas in the Arakan region of Myanmar
by the Rakhine Buddhists with the support of the country’s military
force in the years 1978, 1991/1992, 2012, 2015, 2016, and 2017–18,
created a deep sense of sympathy among the Muslims in south-eastern
Bangladesh, something I elaborated upon in great detail in previous
chapters.
In Bangladesh, the Rohingyas do not enjoy even refugee status.
Against international pressure to shelter and host the Rohingyas as
refugees in its land, Bangladesh often clarifies its position on three
grounds: (1) Bangladesh is not a signatory state of the International
Refugee Convention 1951 and has never ratified it and so, Bangladesh
is not legally obligated to host refugees on its land; (2) Bangladesh is
already an over-populated and developing country, and hence, it cannot,
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 115

under any circumstances, host an additional 1.3 million people on its

land; and (3) if the Rohingyas are given ‘refugee status’, they will start
claiming various kinds of rights under international legal frameworks,
which Bangladesh does not intend to provide them. The three expla-
nations seem convincing from the Bangladeshi point of view, but
from the Rohingya perspective, they are in Bangladesh only to save
their lives as nobody, many said to me, would willingly leave their
country of origin. Many Rohingyas explained to me time and again
that ‘they have basic human rights as human beings in the world’. In
Bangladesh, apart from the state’s position, local people, particularly
people of Ukhia and Teknaf, have gradually become unwelcoming
and, to some extent, intolerant of the Rohingya presence in their
neighbourhood.
During my fieldwork, I observed innumerable counts of human
rights violations committed by local Bengalis, security forces, and law
enforcement agencies, whom I prefer to term as ‘local states’ because
they are the representatives of the central state,25 which most of the
times remained unaddressed. I have written elsewhere that: ‘Using
forced labour of Rohingya refugees with cheap rate or without any
payment, physical attacks without any sensible reason, sexual harass-
ment of Rohingya women, torture by security forces without any rea-
son, evacuating from temporary shelter without any notice, etc. have
been common phenomenon in the lives of Rohingyas … living in and
around Teknaf and Ukhia.’26 During my fieldwork over many years,
I have recorded some facts, figures, and events of such violations of
human rights, a few of which I am presenting in the following sec-
tions to draw attention to the argument that people become subject to
acute atrocities and various forms of discrimination due to their lack
of citizenship and state of statelessness.

Discourse of ‘Fate’ and the State of Vulnerability

The idea of fate, locally called kopal, is very significant in Rohingya
life in both Myanmar and Bangladesh. Sometimes, it is called nioti,
meaning destiny. Rohingyas often blame their kopal for their miser-
able lives and take it as nioti or for granted. Anthropology has a long
tradition of the study of ‘fate’ and ‘destiny’ in various forms in classic27
and modern28 ethnographies. Very recently, in a special issue of
116 The Rohingya

HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory on the anthropology of destiny,

the editors, Alice Elliot and Laura Menin, explained:

Questions surrounding humans’ capacity to act and effect change when

life and possibility are partially or wholly determined by external, often
non-negotiable, powers have long been at the core of theological and
philosophical traditions—from the ancient Greek notion of moira and
early Asian philosophies of karma, to centuries-old Islamic debates on
the concept of qada-. ʾwaʾl-qadar (God’s decree and determination).29

They also wrote, ‘anthropology often discusses destiny in conjunc-

tion with other powerful forces and entities such as luck and fortune,
providence and chance’.30 The Rohingyas quite often use the words
‘kopal’ and ‘nioti’ to indicate their inability and non-capacity to control
what is happening in their lives. In fact, in Rohingya narratives, fate
contains the self-explanation of people’s gain and loss, what people
just cannot explain to their own satisfaction. Fate is an imaginary expla-
nation to justify one’s unexpected and undesired experiences and desti-
nation. It happens when people’s gain or loss goes beyond the limit of
aspiration and expectation. Fate is believed to be God’s will, something
beyond the control of ordinary people, and therefore people blame
or credit ‘fate’ for their gain or loss. Therefore, the Rohingya discourse
of fate and their state of vulnerability are intertwined and interrelated
because sometimes their vulnerability is taken as their kopal and nioti,
rather than accusing those responsible. Yet, in most cases, it reflects
their inability to resist what is happening in their lives.
Many Rohingyas, in both Vasan Para and Pasan Para, on many occa-
sions, talk about a common proverb, kualer lihon no-jai hondon (one
cannot escape one’s fate), because it has been written by Allah. This is
a common belief among the Rohingyas living in both Pasan Para and
Vasan Para that Allah has prescribed a predetermined fate for everyone,
about how and when one is born and dies, what one makes of one’s life,
what all happens in one’s life, and what one’s destiny is. Sometimes, they
explain their critical conditions, in both Bangladesh and Myanmar, as
Allah-r Ichha, meaning Allah’s will. The Rohingya villagers in both the
paras believe that life, death, marriage, livelihood, joys, happiness, sor-
rows, status, prestige, and positions are the states and events of human
experience that are inscribed by the creator, Allah, in each person’s life,
even before they are born. So, they try to justify what they experience as
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 117

non-citizens and stateless people in Bangladesh, and even in Myanmar,

as their ‘fate’ written by Allah. During my fieldwork in July 2016, Hasan
Mia, a Rohingya who lives in Vasan Para, said:

Arrar jibon gorer-o na, ghator-o na (our lives belong to others because we
belong to no one). Since nobody is willing to accept us and shelter us, we
are dealt with as inhuman entities. Since we are neither Burmese (citizens
of Myanmar) nor Bengalis (citizens of Bangladesh), therefore, we are not
recognized by either Bangladesh or Myanmar. Since we do not have any
citizen identity, we are the objects of ill treatment in both countries. We
have taken it for granted as stateless people have no space in any state in
the universe. Since you live in others’ territory, others will write your fate.
Our kopal is written with what we are here today and nioti has brought
us here today. Unfortunately, kopaler lihon, no-jai hondon (fate’s writing
cannot be escaped).

Hasan Mia’s statement contains both his inability to alter his

predetermined fate and his deep grievance of his present vulnerable
conditions in Bangladesh. Interestingly, many Bengali villagers whom
I interviewed told me that the miserable life of Rohingyas is actually
their fate since ‘kualer lihon no-jai hondon’. Sekandar Khan31 (49), a
local Bengali resident of Pasan Para in Ukhia, was talking to me about
the fate of Rohingyas in October 2015. He said:

Rohingyas are not good human beings because they have a tendency of
stealing, robbing, and misappropriating others’ material wealth. They
have come here through illegal paths, live in the locality illegally, and are
involved in illegal activities. Everything about their lives is illegal just as
they are. In fact, people without a state are the people without social and
political integrity. They are non-citizens, and hence, they do not feel
any duties and responsibilities to[wards] any state. They do not abide by
the rules of any state as they are stateless. Therefore, their behaviour has
become peculiarly unfit in a civilized society. In fact, what they are today
is their ultimate ‘kopal’ and ‘nioti’. They have no ‘ghor’ (house), no ‘bari’
(home).32 Kopal kharap hole karo to kichu korar nai (if the fate is bad, what
can others do)?

Both narratives, one from a Rohingya and another from a Bengali,

explicitly reveal that people who have no legal and constitutional status
in the state’s framework always become subject to inhumane treatment
due to their stateless identity,33 which they sometimes take as their
118 The Rohingya

kopal and nioti. It is interesting to note that their miserable lives and
living conditions are often made sense of via the register of ‘fate’. ‘Fate’,
then, becomes the architecture that holds the vulnerable conditions and
powerlessness of people who are deprived of minimum standards of
living and life. Under the notion of ‘fate’, what the local Bengalis and
Rohingya refugees said could be summed up in three ways: First, citizen-
ship is the legal status of people in the society, which at the same time
determines the place and status of non-citizens in the host society. Since
non-citizens hold ‘illegal’ existence, they are treated as illegal migrants
and unwelcome outsiders or, at best, refugees who always hold a subor-
dinate social and political position in the host society. Second, under the
dynamics of perceiving ‘fate’ as ‘God’s will’, stateless people and refugees
take their miserable living conditions as ‘fate’, due to their incapability
to amend what has already been written by God. They often become
subject to human rights violations, bad health facilities, poor living con-
ditions in slums and camps, atrocities, and discrimination committed
by state agents, which many Rohingyas consider as their ‘kopal’. Third,
the people of the host society look at stateless people and refugees with
a negative image because the host society has to share their scopes and
resources as well as shoulder the ‘burden’ of additional people. Since
it is understood that citizenship is the relationship of people with the
state confirming certain amenities in terms of rights and duties,34 state-
less people remain beyond this ambit and, hence, could do anything
without any moral or legal obligation to the state.
Since the stateless people move from one state to another, they
become ‘doubly marginalized’35 as suspended from their place of
origin and as unwelcome people in the place of migration. In the
case of Rohingyas, Myanmar has gradually become intolerant about
the presence of Rohingyas in its state territory. Therefore, they were
forced to leave Burma in 1978 in the name of Operation Nagamin,
made stateless in 1982 by the enactment of the debatable Myanmar
Citizenship Law, and compelled to flee due to the launch of a deadly
operation called Operation Clean and Beautiful Nation in 1991/92,
with another similar clearance operation in 2017. So, the Rohingyas
have gradually been pushed to the margins of the state in Myanmar.
In Bangladesh, the Rohingyas do not enjoy even a refugee status as
they are now collectively labelled as FDMN through the making of
the biometric database.
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 119

Figure 5.1 Reporting place of Rohingyas just after their arrival in Bangladesh
but before their placement in camps
Source: Author’s personal collection.

Living with the ‘Local State’ and the (Re)production

of ‘Bare Life’
In the modern political system, ‘the state’ is popularly understood as the
necessary political institution of a centralized government that holds
and operates ‘legitimate’ use of force and power within a given territory.
Instead of concentrating on the centre of power and its organized opera-
tion, anthropologists pay attention to local forms of the state amidst its
various roles and operations. Aradhana Sharma and Akhil Gupta con-
centrate on ‘everyday practices of bureaucrats and their representation
of the state’.36 Similarly, James Scott37 regards state not in its centrality
but in its existence in the margin, and hence, the margin historically
tends to run away from the state. James Ferguson also argued that the
‘expansion of bureaucratic state power, then does not necessarily mean
that “the masses” can be centrally coordinated or ordered around
more efficiently; it only means that more power relations are referred
120 The Rohingya

through state channels’.38 Anthropologists now focus on the manifesta-

tions of the state in everyday discourse and of how people experience the
local agents of central bureaucratic state. Veena Das and Deborah
Poole explain, ‘in mapping the effects and the presence of “the state”
in local life, anthropologists often look for signs of administrative and
hierarchical rationalities that provide seemingly ordered links with the
political and regulatory apparatus of a central bureaucrat state.’39 In a
similar fashion, Gupta understands state with ‘the analysis of the every-
day practices of local bureaucracies and the discursive construction of the
state in public culture’.40 Therefore, an effective way of understanding
the state is to grasp how people at the local level define and redefine
political order and bureaucratic system. Talal Asad has argued that ‘the
state dominates and defends the community, orders and nurtures its
civil life … the state’s abstract character is precisely what enables it to
define and sustain the margin as margin through a range of administra-
tive practices’.41 So, the ranges of administrative practices at the local
level could be meaningful symptoms to understand state in people’s
everyday life.
Here, I consider the ‘local state’ in three dimensions: (1) the law
enforcement agencies as the classic representation of the central state;
(2) ‘local people’ who represent the dominant notions of ‘stateness’
before the Rohingyas; and (3) the civil administration and local
bureaucracy reflected as the ‘local state’ in south-eastern Bangladesh. I
will discuss the ways in which these three forms of ‘local state’ deal with
the Rohingyas in Ukhia and Teknaf and contribute to their marginal,
stateless, and vulnerable identity.42

Relations with the Classic Representation of the State

In Bangladesh, the law enforcement agencies are often considered the
classic representation of the state.43 In that sense, the classic representa-
tion of the state in Bangladesh consists of the Bangladesh Police (BP),
the BGB, the RAB, the Bangladesh Military (BM), the Bangladesh Ansar
Village Defence Party (VDB), and the Coast Guard of Bangladesh (CGB).
Since migrated Rohingyas are stateless and are living in Bangladesh as
‘illegal people’, they face arbitrary detention and arrests, imprisonment,
and frequent torture at the hands of the law enforcement agencies day in
and day out. The police personnel in Pasan Para in Ukhia and the BGB
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 121

in the Vasan Para in Teknaf are in charge of law and order and dealing
with crimes involving Rohingyas. Before the arrival of the new migrant
Rohingyas in 2017 and prior to the settlement of 32 temporary Rohingya
refugee camps, the police frequently raided the two makeshift camps—
Taal in Ukhia and Leda in Teknaf—of Rohingya refugees on alleged
grounds of possession of illegal drugs and arms and ammunition, and
to crack down on criminals. This is because Rohingya camps have always
been reportedly represented as places of various alleged criminal activi-
ties including drug business, arms trade, human trafficking, sex work,
and the hub of thieves and robbers; their camps are sites of rampant
and indiscriminate police brutality. In fact, camps across the world are
largely represented with various negative connotations.44
Many local and national dailies regularly publish news on Yaba45
trade, border smuggling, illegal arms trading, various kinds of social
crimes, and militant activities where Rohingyas living in Ukhia and
Teknaf and Rohingya camps are directly involved. This sort of percep-
tion and media representation further aids and abets the frequency
of raids by law enforcement agencies in the Rohingya camps and in
villages where unregistered Rohingyas live. Similar raids take place in
Vasan Para and Pasan Para, but less frequently in comparison to those
in Taal and Leda. Under the garb of raids, law enforcement agencies
often violate human rights as severe atrocities take place. ‘Rohingyas are
treated very inhumanly, exploited using the space of their vulnerable
social conditions, forced to provide cheap labour, harassed sexually
… tortured by security forces as violation of human rights.’46 I have
recorded numerous cases of police raids that many Rohingyas told me
about on several occasions. Hasibuddin (62), an unregistered Rohingya
living in Pasan Para, explained to me in July 2012:

It was November 2011, when I was living in a roadside house with my

family. Some police personnel came at midnight and woke me up. The
officer was accusing me of committing a robbery that took place in Ukhia
Bazar two hours ago. The police officer was saying that a few witnesses
had informed him that I was one of the dacoits who did the robbery.
The robbers robbed one electronics shop and one shop of full of ladies’
clothes. While the officer was talking to me, the other police personnel
started searching my house. They did not feel like taking my consent
before beginning the search. My wife, two daughters, and one son who
were sleeping were brought out of the house. They searched my house
122 The Rohingya

meticulously but found nothing. Then some of the police personnel

started beating me and accusing me of hiding the stolen goods some-
where else. I tried to explain, but they were not ready to listen to me and
remained unconvinced. When my wife, daughters, and son came forward
and attempted to save me, the rest of the policemen started beating them.
After half an hour of torture, they stopped beating. They said that they
would arrest me if I did not provide them ‘true information’ and return
all the stolen goods within two days. I was sleeping at home while the
robbery was taking place; how could I return the stolen goods? But they
seemed to stick to their position and I was warned of detention if I did
not return the stolen goods. This is not a single event, but a frequent one
that we have been experiencing in Pasan Para since we came to stay here.
We cannot complain to anyone or seek justice from any authority
since we are considered illegal residents in Bangladesh. Like me, many
other Rohingyas living here often go through similar experiences. Now
we understand in every breath, haak (rights) is not ours because we have
no mulluk (state).

This narrative shows how law enforcement agencies deal with

Rohingyas in Bangladesh. However, this is not a unique case as it
happens on a regular basis. Many Rohingyas who came in 1978 and
1991/1992 went through various forms of discrimination and arbitrary
treatment by the local state on many occasions. Jasim Ali, a Rohingya
who crossed the border in 1991 and now lives with his family in Leda
refugee camp in Teknaf, told me once in 2015 about his bitter experi-
ence of BGB torture. Jasim Ali is well-informed about Rakhine State,
Rohingya past and present, and the state of different Rohingya camps
in Bangladesh. He was one of the key informants in my research and
helped me improve my Rohingya-speaking ability even though I am a
Chittagonian. He explained to me:
The Naf River is used for frequent Yaba tablet trading. Smugglers transport
the tablet from Myanmar to Bangladesh through the Teknaf border of
Bangladesh. The BGB, entitled to guard the border, often arrest smugglers
and Yaba traders with hundreds of thousands of Yaba. Many Rohingyas
living in Leda camp are said to be involved in Yaba trading and transpor-
tation at the Myanmar and Bangladesh border. One evening, a jeep of
BGB soldiers raided the Leda camp searching for Yaba tablets, but found
nothing. They looked for me as I am known to many as one of the edu-
cated Rohingyas who can communicate with people outside the Rohingya
world. When I came to talk to them, they started questioning me, asking:
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 123

Who are the Yaba business people here? Where are they? How much per-
centage do you take from them? Who are the other Rohingyas involved in
bringing Yaba tablets from Borma? Where do you keep the Yaba tablets?
Where is the gudam ghar (store of Yaba tablets)? What are the channels
to send Yaba to Chittagong and Dhaka? I said that I heard some people
are involved in Yaba trading, but I do not know who they are. The BGB
officers, without saying anything, started hitting me with rifles. In a couple
of minutes, I started bleeding, but they continued shouting, ‘do not try to
be over smart’, ‘we know you are the Yaba boss’, and ‘lying is your culture’.
At one point, they stopped beating me and said, ‘We are leaving but will
come again. We have given you shelter here to stay in peace, but not to
do illegal business and Yaba trading.’ I was still bleeding and lying on the
ground when the BGB jeep left. I could do nothing but endure this physi-
cal torture. We have nowhere to go, but to accept our destiny of inhuman
suffering and everyday forms of discrimination.

I recorded many stories during my fieldwork in Vasan Para and Pasan

Para as well as other makeshift camps where I found that ‘arbitrary
detention’, ‘merciless beating’, ‘frequent raids’, ‘accusations of stealing
and robbery’, and ‘threat of eviction’ were very common. This strongly
demonstrates that the state is very much present at the very local level
of Rohingya samaj (society) and in the everyday life of the Rohingyas,
though they are widely known as stateless people. What Hasibuddin
and Jasim Ali said manifest two important aspects of Rohingya life
in dealing with the ‘local state’: First, if any crime happens and any
offense takes place in the locality in Ukhia and Teknaf, south-eastern
Bangladesh, Rohingyas are the first suspects and accused, branded and
reduced to the status of perpetrators due to their social status and the
ease with which they can be framed. It has become a taken-for-granted
fact in the last two decades that Rohingyas are definitely involved in
cases of stealing, robbery, hijacking, and snatching that takes place in
Ukhia and Teknaf. Second, the Rohingyas have no formal rights to lodge
complaints with any office or seek justice from any authority; they, in
most cases, have no rights to say anything but have to accept what is
said to them. In fact, during my fieldwork spanning different periods of
time, I listened to many Rohingyas and recorded several cases similar to
Hasibuddin’s experience, which reveal that the Rohingyas are dealt with
inhumanly, as they are regarded as ‘bare life’,47 a life without any legal
existence, and ‘non-life’,48 meaning a life without recognition by any
124 The Rohingya

authority, which I call ‘subhuman life’. This statement also unfolds the
premise that the lack of citizenship makes people a non-entity in the
state structure because citizenship is what gives us, as Arendt phrased it,
‘the right to have all rights’.49

Relations with the Dominant Notions of ‘Stateness’

During my fieldwork in Vasan Para and Pasan Para, I was told time
and again by the local Bengalis about the various crimes committed
by the Rohingyas. ‘Oun hono mainshor jaat no’ (they are not human
race) is a common sentence that majority of local Bengalis begin with
when talking about the Rohingyas. In most cases, local Bengalis blame
the Rohingyas for their innumerable miseries. Jafarullah (59), a local
Bengali, had this to say about the Rohingyas in December 2014 while
I was in Vasan Para.

Rohingya are not manush (human), januar januar (animals; beast).

If you give them food, they demand shelter. If you give them shelter,
they want to sleep with your spouse. If you give them a plate of rice,
after eating, they will make a hole in the plate. They do not know
how to acknowledge people for their help, as they are beimaneer jaat
(extremely ungrateful nation). They can turn their eyes back in a minute
without any sensible reason. They can break the relations of ten years
in ten seconds without any feelings. They can kill one only for 100 BDT
without any feeling of guilt. They are encouraging their young girls to
exploit our sons and allow elopement. Through this process, they are
destroying our social bondage and family hierarchy. They are now used
as the political cadres of militant groups, which is making our social and
political life unstable. Besides, stealing, robbery, and hijacking are like
‘panta-vat’ (water-rice) for them, something they are doing frequently
as if they have the license to do so. The Rohingyas have made our lives
more complicated. In fact, since they have come into our lives, peace has
gone from the society.

This statement reveals how bad the relations between the local
Bengalis and Rohingyas are in the area. Many local Bengalis do not even
think of Rohingyas as human beings, which is reflected in Jafarullah’s
statement. One can easily imagine that if this what they think of the
Rohingyas, what kind of treatment must the latter be receiving from
Bengalis. In fact, the stateless status of Rohingyas in Bangladesh
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 125

contributes to the representation of strong stateness embedded in

Bengali behaviour, which is supported by the state agents.
We can thereby understand the dominant notion of stateness sup-
ported by state agents in the behaviour of local Bengalis, something
Paul Brass explains thus: ‘the state could be understood based on its
role in supporting the privileged sections of society’.50 Rohingya lives
in Bangladesh are subject to arbitrary treatment by local Bengalis who
uphold notions of stateness in their behaviour or what I prefer to call
‘local state’.
Bangladesh became independent in 1971 following a bloody libera-
tion war, which was the outcome of a strong sense of Bengali national-
ism. From the very beginning of the state formation and nation-building,
Bengalis have felt a strong sense of ownership of the Bangladeshi state
that is explicitly reflected in dealing with non-Bengalis, particularly
indigenous people living in Bangladesh.51 But indigenous people have
citizenship and are considered as residents of Bangladesh, whereas
the Rohingyas are non-citizens and majority of them are regarded
as non-refugees. Besides, Rohingyas are accused of creating numerous
problems in the lives of Bengalis. During my fieldwork in Pasan Para,
Saiful Kalam (57), an unregistered Rohingya refugee, explained to me
in July 2016:
The Rohingyas in the land of Bangladesh are treated as nothing less
than a curse, a curse for the local Bengalis. We are regarded as criminal
migrants, illegal outsiders and, hence, are dealt with unexplainable cru-
elty. Let me share one experience. One early morning, when I had just
woken up and was having breakfast with my family members, a group
of local Bengalis came to my yard and started shouting my name. I came
out and wanted to know what had happened. They were blaming me and
accusing me of stealing coconuts (300 in number) from my neighbour
Kabir Mia’s backyard last night. I tried to convince them that I did not
do it, that I would not do so as Kabir Mia is my neighbour. They seemed
very angry and were not ready to listen to anything. After some angry
conversation, one of them started beating me and the rest of them set
fire to my house and burnt it down. My family members were trying to
take some household goods out of the house, but they failed as they were
not allowed to do so. I had to watch my little straw house burning in
front of my eyes. We were thrown on the street. This is the irony of our
lives. Where will we go? Whom will we complain to? Where will we seek
justice from? We cannot seek anything from anyone. Our choice, desire,
126 The Rohingya

and dreams are determined by the local people as they deal with us like
animals. Therefore, sometimes, we feel we are not human beings because
we are Rohingyas. Many Rohingyas have started believing that Rohingyas
are not human beings.

The narrative of Saiful Kalam unveils the cruel reality of Rohingya

life, especially the everyday humiliation meted out to them by Bengalis.
This is not an individual’s narrative or the telling of an individual event,
but an integral part of everyday survival for Rohingyas in the south-eastern
part of Bangladesh, as far as my field experience goes. Saiful Kamal’s
statement shows two important aspects of the structure of relations
between the local Bengalis and Rohingyas: First, the lack of citizenship
not only makes people stateless, but also valueless, depriving them of
human recognition and dignity. Second, citizenship also gives rise to a
sense of stateness among the citizens of a state, composed of the elites
dominant enough to rule and regulate the life of non-citizens. The
displaced Rohingyas in Bangladesh are ruled and regulated by this
sense of stateness embedded in Bengalis’ attitudes towards them.

Figure 5.2 Typical Rohingya camp with roofs made of plastic sheets
Source: Author’s personal collection.
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 127

Relations with the ‘Local States’

Local bureaucracy through the local government that deals with people
at the local level is considered the manifestation of the central state
because it reflects and implements the state’s policy and politics; there-
fore, it is called the ‘local state’.52 In Bangladesh, the local government
consists of city corporations, zila parishad (district council), pawrash-
ova (city), upazila parishad (sub-district council), and union parishad
(union council), which are the local organs of the central government.
Since Teknaf is a pawrashova and Ukhia is an upazila, Rohingyas living
in Teknaf need to deal with ward commissioners and ward officials,
whilst those who live in Ukhia need to deal with the union parishad
chairperson, members, and union parishad officials. In fact, Rohingyas
living in south-eastern Bangladesh have very little to do with this ‘local
state’, but the local states still play a vital role in regulating their lives.
The Rohingyas have very limited engagement with the local administra-
tion and the local representation except in two ways. First, in order to
handle cases of elopement, the Rohingyas often need to go to the union
parishad in Ukhia and ward office in Teknaf to attend a meeting called
by the elected chairperson or commissioners of the parishad. Second,
they need to go to the union parishad in Ukhia and ward office in
Teknaf to deal with land disputes because they build temporary shel-
ters on land that belongs to the government or what is locally called
‘Khash land’. During my fieldwork, I noticed that in many cases, the
Rohingyas were accused of doing all misdeeds and given punishments
in the forms of physical assaults, fines, gifting a cow or dozens of hens,
and holding ears in front of all. Sometimes, verdicts such as ten slaps
on the spot in front of everyone were also given. However, Rohingyas
cannot help but accept the decision and punishment given by the
chairperson and members at the meeting. I observed many such cases
in both Pasan Para and Vasan Para where the Rohingyas were given
stern punishments despite them not being responsible. Lokman Hasan,
an unregistered Rohingya of Pasan Para in Ukhia, one day explained to
me in October 2012:

One union parishad member of Ukhia, Faizuddin Chowdhury, a power-

ful local Bengali, called a meeting in the evening and I was summoned
to attend the meeting as I was the main accused. My wife was also asked
to attend the meeting with me. I appeared at the meeting on time. I saw
128 The Rohingya

that many local Bengalis were present there before I arrived. Chowdhury
was chairing the meeting as an elected commissioner of the union pari-
shad, who was entitled and empowered to settle the local disputes. I was
accused of encouraging my daughter (Sabiha, 20) to elope with a local
boy (Hashem, 26). Hashem’s father, Azizul Hoque, was telling the meet-
ing: eta etar mayare aar fuar pechhone lagai diee. Aar fuar matha nosto gori
diee. Etar maya aar fuaree vulai-valai palai gioi. Mul ashami oilo Lokmainna.
(He allowed his daughter to exploit my son. His daughter tricked my son
into marrying her. His daughter exploited my son. They eloped three days
ago. The main culprit is not his daughter, but him, Lokman.) The chair
of the meeting asked me to respond to Hashem’s father’s accusation, but
what could I say? I said two young adults fell in love and decided to
marry. What’s my fault? What could I do? Chowdhury finally gave a judg-
ment saying, ‘Hashem’s parents have brought up and educated their son
with great hardship. Hashem was the centre of their hopes and aspira-
tion. However, your daughter has ruined everything. Besides, you know
that marrying a Rohingya girl is a matter of social stigma in the local
society. Your daughter has ruined everything by tarnishing Hashem’s par-
ents’ social prestige and status. Since your daughter did it, you must take
the responsibility.’ As punishment, I was asked to give 1 milking cow,
20 hens, and 20,000 BDT to Hashem’s parents. Apart from these, I was
ordered to provide one colour TV, one sofa set, one bedstead, one dress-
ing table, and one cabinet as dowry to Hashem’s parents. Finally, I was
threatened that if my other daughters would commit this ‘crime’, I would
be evicted with my family from Ukhia. I tried to convince them that it
would be impossible for me to meet their demands and punishment. I
was given six months’ time, but I could not manage to put that kind of
money together by the end of a year even. Consequently, my daughter
Sabiha was kicked out of her in-laws’ house due to my failure to provide
the dowry set upon me in the meeting. However, I could not seek any
justice from Chowdhury or anyone else. I could not lodge any complaint
with any court or any law enforcement agencies because I do not have
any legal identity. Actually, all this happened because we have no mulluk.
No mulluk, no haak (no state, no rights).

This narrative reveals many issues that are crucial for understand-
ing the ways in which the local state deals with the Rohingyas. The
Rohingyas are quite often victimized under various pretexts. Three
important issues have come up from this narrative. First, the local
state always works in favour of the majority, whilst the minority are less
prioritized which is widely found in the Chittagong Hill Tracts where
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 129

indigenous people experience similar treatment from the local states.53

However, in the case of non-citizens who are neither majorities nor
minorities, the local state behaves blindly and indiscriminately because
it does not care about whether it is justice or injustice, right or wrong,
and fair or unfair. The arbitrary becomes a constant mode of oppression
of the Rohingyas. Lokman is the recipient of such blind arbitration.
Second, the local state makes the vulnerable more vulnerable.
Having knowledge of the incapacities and the desperate condition of
the Rohingyas, with its punishment, the community throws any pos-
sible room of humanitarian process out of the window. Third, the
stateless Rohingyas have to accept all sorts of impositions regardless of
their consent, of any notion of fair or unfair because of their precarious
position in Bangladesh. The story of the citizen then finds its legitimacy
in the negation of the non-citizen.

***

People migrate from one place to another and one state to another
for various reasons, such as the promise of a better economic fortune,
but the Rohingyas migrated to Bangladesh to escape persecution
after having been stripped of their citizen status in Myanmar, despite
having lived there for centuries. Fleeing persecution, the Rohingyas
migrated to Bangladesh in search of a better life, but they have not
achieved the dignity of a refugee or an asylum seeker. They are, at best,
seen by Bangladeshi society as ‘illegal migrants’, ‘socially disordered
people’, ‘unwelcome intruders’, and ‘illegal objects.’ More often than
not, the atrocities, injustice, and rights violation they have been sub-
jected to have been marked by the prejudice and hatred of the local
state. Vulnerability becomes the fabric of the everyday, statelessness
and non-citizenship its threads and weave. Since citizenship is the
gateway to many other rights, non-citizens are deprived of all sorts of
human rights, civil and political rights, which render their lives ‘bare’
in an Agambenian sense. ‘Bare’ life is a disposable and unworthy
life. In Bangladesh, the local state, community, and the central state
together contribute to the dehumanization of the Rohingyas. While the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) and the Declaration of
Non-Nationals (1985) confirm their human rights, Bangladesh con-
tinues to cite the problem of scant resources and homegrown poverty.
130 The Rohingya

Between the recognition and the denial of the Rohingyas as people, it

is more urgent than ever to consider their plight from the point of view
of rights and entitlement as human beings and not the instrumentalist,
evasive view of the Bangladeshi state.

Notes
1. See Kristy Belton, ‘Statelessness: A Matter of Human Rights,’ in The
Human Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept, eds. Rhoda Howard-Hassmann
and Margaret Walton-Roberts (Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press,
2015), 31–44.
2. See Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).
3. See Article 15 (1 & b) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
1948 that reads: (1) Everyone has the right to a nationality; (2) No one shall
be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his
nationality. ‘Universal Declaration of Human Rights,’ United Nations, accessed
13 January 2019, http://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/.
4. Nasir Uddin, ‘State of Stateless People: The Plight of Rohingya Refugees in
Bangladesh,’ in Human Rights to Citizens: A Slippery Concept, eds. Rhoda Howard-
Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts (USA: The University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015), 62.
5. See David Plotke, ‘The Rights of Noncitizens: Introduction,’ Politics &
Society 42, no. 3 (2014): 287–91; Rogers M. Smith, ‘National Obligations and
Noncitizens: Special Rights, Human Rights, and Immigration,’ Politics & Society
42, no. 3 (2014): 381–98; David Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of Non-citizens
(USA: Oxford University Press, 2008).
6. See Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle
for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b).
7. Since 1978, when the Rohingyas started crossing borders, they were
widely known as ‘the people from Burma’ and hence called ‘Bormaya’ in general.
8. See Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Volume 1 (Boston, MA:
Vantage Books, 1976).
9. See Elizabeth Povinelli, Geontologies: A Requiem to Late Liberalism
(Durham: Duke University Press, 2016).
10. By the theory of ‘geontologies’, Elizabeth Povinelli talks about the
mechanism of power that makes a distinction between ‘lives’ and ‘non-lives’,
where ‘non-lives’ are dealt with differently compared to ‘lives’. The Rohingyas
are apparently ‘non-lives’ and are therefore dealt with accordingly from the stat-
ist perspective. See Povinelli, Geontologies.
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 131

11. The chapter is based largely on ethnographic fieldwork undertaken

before the new arrival of the Rohingyas following the massive campaign that
started on 25 August 2017. The fieldwork was undertaken for 16 months in total
between 2001 and 2016 in different phases in two villages, namely Vasan Para
(pseudonym) located in Teknaf and Pasan Para (pseudonym) located in Ukhia
of Cox’s Bazar in the south-western part of Bangladesh. This empirical experience
has been supplemented by my close observation as a local resident of Cox’s
Bazar for more than two-and-a-half decades of the flow of Rohingya migrations,
the process of their temporary settlements, the attempts at permanent
social integration, and the roles of state and non-state actors in dealing with
the Rohingyas in the south-eastern part of Bangladesh. The data used here is
comprehensive and descriptive in nature; the methodology of the research is
qualitative and ethnographic.
12. M. Fineman, ‘The Vulnerable Subject: Anchoring Equality in the Human
Condition,’ Yale Journal of Law and Feminism 20, no. 1 (2008): 1–23.
13. Cited in N. Kohn, ‘Vulnerability Theory and the Roles of Government,’
Yale Journal of Law and Feminism 26, no. 1 (2014): 3.
14. See, for details, P. Green and T. Ward, State Crime: Governments, Violence
and Corruption (London: Pluto Press, 2004).
15. J. Butler, The Precarious Life: The Power of Mourning and Violence (London/
New York: Verso, 2004).
16. Butler, The Precarious Life, xv.
17. I. Lorey, State of Insecurity: Government of the Precarious, trans. A. Derieg
(London/New York: Verso, 2015).
18. Lorey, State of Insecurity, 1.
19. Michael Safi, ‘Myanmar Treatment of Rohingya Looks like “Textbook Ethnic
Cleansing”, says UN,’ Guardian, 11 September 2017, accessed 28 October 2018,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/11/un-myanmars-treatment-of-
rohingya-textbook-example-of-ethnic-cleansing.
20. For details, see Penny Green, Thomas MacManus, and Alicia de la Cour
Venning, Countdown Annihilation: Genocide in Myanmar (London: International
State Crime Initiative, 2015).
21. See Nasir Uddin and Nasreen Chowdhory, eds., Deterritoiralised Identity
and Transborder Movement in South Asia (Singapore: Springer, 2019).
22. See Nasir Uddin, The Voices of the Victims: The ‘Subhuman’ Life of the
Rohingya (An unpublished research monograph on the Rohingya victims of
2017 campaign in Rakhine State, 2019d).
23. See Kirsten McConnachie, Governing Refugees: Justice, Order and
Legal Pluralism (London and New York: Routledge, 2014); Elena Fiddian-
Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long, and Nando Sigona, eds., The Oxford
Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies (Oxford: Oxford University
132 The Rohingya

Press, 2014); Anna Triandafyllidou, ed., Routledge Handbook of Immigration and

Refugee Studies (London and New York: Routledge, 2015).
24. See Uddin. Not Rohingyas, but Royainga; Abdul Karim, The Rohingyas: A
Short Account of Their History and Culture (Chittagong: Arakan Historical Society,
2016).
25. See Akhil Gupta, Red Tape: Bureaucracy, Structural Violence and Poverty in
India (Durham: Duke University Press, 2012).
26. Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle
for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka. Murddhanno Publisher, 2017a), 95.
27. For example, Meyer Fortes, Oedipus and Job in West African Religion
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1959); Mary Douglas, Purity and
Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo (London: Routledge,
[1996] 2001); E.E. Evans-Pritchard, Witchcraft, Oracles, and Magic among the
Azande (Oxford: Clarendon Press, [1937] 1976).
28. For example, Michael Lambek, Knowledge and Practice in Mayotte: Local
Discourses of Islam, Sorcery, and Spirit Possession (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1993); Donald J. Hatfield, ‘Fate in the Narrativity and Experience of Selfhood:
A Case from Taiwanese Chhiam Divination,’ American Ethnologist 29, no. 4 (2002):
857–77; Stéphanie Homola, ‘Caught in the Language of Fate: The Quality of
Destiny in Taiwan,’ HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 8, no. 1/2 (2018): 329–42.
29. Alice Elliot and Laura Menin, ‘For an Anthropology of Destiny,’ HAU:
Journal of Ethnographic Theory 8, no. 1/2 (2018): 292.
30. Elliot and Menin, ‘For an Anthropology of Destiny,’ 283.
31. Sekandar Khan is a local business person. He used to work in a Rohingya
camp as field facilitator for an NGO in 2010–12. Now he has a dry-fish business,
which is profitable. He sometimes employs Rohingyas in his dry-fish factory
because he can hire them at lower wages. He has strong reservations about the
Rohingyas based on his personal experience. I interviewed him in a local res-
taurant in 2015.
32. ‘Ghor’ and ‘Bari’ are used in everyday conversation in the Chittagong
region. Here, ‘ghor’ means house, a physical entity, and ‘bari’ means family, a
social entity. According to many Bengali locals, the Rohingyas have no ghor as
they live in a tent-like house and no bari as their family members are scattered
here and there in both Bangladesh and Myanmar.
33. See, for details, Alison Kesby, The Right to Have Rights: Citizenships,
Humanity and International Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012); Emma
Larking, Refugees and the Myth of Human Rights: Life outside the Pale of the Law
(London and New York: Routledge, 2014).
34. See Rhoda Howard-Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts, eds., The
Human Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept (Pennsylvania: The University of
Pennsylvania Press, 2015).
 The (Re)production of Vulnerability 133

35. The idea of ‘doubly marginal’ came out of the discussion of the research-
er’s position in the ethnographic fieldwork by Evans-Pritchard. According to
Evans-Pritchard, an ethnographer is ‘doubly marginal’ in a sense, suspended
between the ethnographer’s own society and the society under investigation
(Adam Kuper, Anthropology and Anthropologists. The Modern British School, 3rd
edition [London & New York: Routledge, 1996]. Here, I use ‘doubly marginal’
to indicate the extreme marginality of the Rohingyas who are marginal because
Myanmar rendered them stateless and Bangladesh is not ready to recognize
them as ‘refugees’.
36. Aradhana Sharma and Akhil Gupta, eds., The Anthropology of the State: A
Reader (USA, UK, and Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2006), 277.
37. See J.C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the
Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998).
38. J. Ferguson, The Anti-Politics Machine: ‘Development’, Depoliticization
and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press,
1994), 263.
39. See V. Das and D. Poole, eds., Anthropology in the Margins of the State
(New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004), 5.
40. A. Gupta, ‘Blurred Boundaries: The Discourse of Corruption, the
Culture of Politics and the Imagined State,’ American Ethnologist 22, no. 2
(1995): 376.
41. T. Asad, ‘Where Are the Margins of the State?’, in Anthropology in the
Margins of the State, eds. V. Das and D. Poole (New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2004), 281.
42. See Paula Banerjee, Anasua Basu Ray Chaudhury, and Atig Ghosh,
eds., The State of Being Stateless: An Account of South Asia (New Delhi: Orient
BlackSwan, 2016).
43. See Nasir Uddin and Eva Gerharz, ‘The Many Faces of the State: Living in
Peace and Conflict in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh,’ Society and Conflict
2, no. 1 (2017): 208–26.
44. For details, see Sigona Nando, ‘Campzenship: Reimagining the Camp as
a Social and Political Space,’ Citizenship Studies 19, no. 1 (2015): 1–15.
45. Yaba is a kind of stimulant pill that is used to enhance sexuality. It
contains a mixture of methamphetamine and caffeine. Myanmar is the largest
Yaba-producing country in the world and, as a borderland, Teknaf and Ukhia
are popularly known as Yaba-trading zones.
46. Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle
for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017a), 90.
47. See Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, trans.
D. Heller-Roazen (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998).
48. Povinelli, Geontologies.
134 The Rohingya

49. See Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt
Books, 1994).
50. P.R. Brass, Theft of an Idol: Text and Context in the Representation of
Collective Violence (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997).
51. See Uddin and Gerharz, ‘ The Many Faces of the State’.
52. See also Das and Poole, Anthropology in the Margins of the State; Gupta,
‘Blurred Boundaries’; Gupta, Red Tape; Sharma and Gupta, The Anthropology of
the State.
53. See Uddin and Gerharz, ‘ The Many Faces of the State.’
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life
6 Untold Pains and Miseries and Uncertain Futures

V ulnerability is a state of living that make peoples’ lives—both

individually and collectively—inconsistent and irregular in terms
of peace and stability. The vulnerable people exist in a state of com-
plete uncertainty with an absolute absence of rights of any kind, fac-
ing the non-recognition of their existence by legal frameworks of the
state.1 Extreme vulnerability enhances and perpetuates the conditions
of vulnerability that render people helpless, reproducing a chain of
helplessness. Vulnerability touches everyone: the forcibly displaced and
dispossessed; asylum seekers; refugees; the stateless; working classes; the
landless; the lower castes and classes; minorities in terms of gender, com-
munity, and ethnicity; the occupied and the militarized populations; the
illegally detained and imprisoned; the assassinated; the survivors of civil
war and mass crimes such as genocides and riots; the agrarian classes;
the developing nations; and the Global South. From the community to
the nation, from the regional to the transnational, vulnerability affects
different segments of the population depending on their situational and
material conditions and the structures enabling them.2
If it happens in the lives of migrants who have fled persecution,
more often than not, the forcibly displaced people experience double-
edged vulnerabilities both in the place of origin and the place of migra-
tion. In the case of the Rohingyas, having left Myanmar, their place
of origin, under the compulsion of life-threatening situations, they are
unwelcome when they arrive in Bangladesh—branded as intruders,
The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
136 The Rohingya

illegal bodies, and a socio-economic burden.3 The extremely vulner-

able live with the uncertainty of having nowhere to go and no one to
turn to. This is the central argument of this chapter. If a group of people
are denied the right to a home, denied access to a place to live in, and
given no recourse to an organized community or body that recognizes
their voice, they become extremely vulnerable in this world. This chapter
contextualizes this premise with the case of the Rohingyas as the
vulnerable people in both Myanmar and Bangladesh.
One of the important methodological challenges of doing empirical
research on the Rohingyas is to get insights about what is happening in
the Myanmar part of the Rohingya world. Whatever I have discussed,
stated, and analysed in this book is solely based on my decade-long
engagement with the Rohingyas living in Bangladesh. In order to draw
a comprehensive picture of the Rohingyas, we need to have a detailed
narrative on what is happening inside Myanmar too. The informa-
tion we receive about the plight of the Rohingyas in Rakhine State
of Myanmar is based on four sources: (1) state-sponsored informa-
tion provided by the state machinery and state-controlled agencies;
(2) drone footage recorded by various international media outlets and
human rights bodies; (3) high-quality photographs and footage of
some Rakhine State villages taken by journalists on the Bangladesh–
Myanmar border; and (4) testimonies based on the lived experience
of the Rohingyas and how they crossed the border into Bangladesh
and elsewhere. Of the four potential sources of information, the most
authentic, reliable, and comprehensive information about the plight
of the Rohingyas living in Rakhine State are the personal narratives of
the newly arrived Rohingyas in Bangladesh, which I have discussed in
the beginning of the book. The works of Primo Levi are notable here,
based on which, among others, Agamben built his theory of ‘bare life’.4
This chapter aims to fulfil this vacuum because it contains the narra-
tives of the Rohingyas who have recently crossed the border, having
survived the blurring of boundaries between ‘life and death’ in Rakhine
State. This chapter provides its readers with some excerpts and impres-
sions on the lives of the Rohingyas and their vulnerable conditions in
Rakhine State of Myanmar.
Academia, particularly the social sciences, has a tendency not to listen
to those narratives which we often talk about, particularly in the early
anthropological literature of Lewis Henry Morgan,5 E.B. Tylor,6 and
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 137

James Frazer,7 who were widely regarded as armchair anthropologists.8

This sort of practice is still dominant in many texts in social science,
which do not listen to the voice of the people concerned as much as they
should. Either we put our words into the mouths of the people being
studied or we use our voices to tell their stories. Therefore, the people
often end up becoming mere objects of discussion and remain unheard.
Consequently, the gap between field-level narratives and what gets
written about them remains unbridged, and hence, knowledge production
remains in the hands of a coterie of academicians and researchers
who are relatively privileged in terms of their social position, political
background, economic status and the cultural capital at their disposal.
Unequal relations between researchers and their subjects of study were
codified through the prism of the politics of representation until the
mid-1990s.9 But now, the discourse and methods are much more sus-
tained and have moved to a newer direction. Ethnographic research is
more and more collaborative between the researcher and the people,
research where both reflect reciprocally in what could be called a ‘joint
product’.10 In fact, reciprocal engagement, mutual trust, and long-term
research collaboration11 between the ethnographer and the object of
study could make the product of fieldwork, known as ethnography,
more reliable, sensible, and argumentative in order to form a ‘cultural
critique’.12 This chapter will build on the voices of the Rohingyas and
their narratives from their lived experiences. It is worth mentioning
here that though I have been conducting research work in these two
villages for years, I have undertaken an extensive fieldwork of the recently
arrived Rohingya refugees who are kept in Balukhali and Kutupalang
temporary refugee camps set up in Ukhia. I have interviewed 500 of
the newly arrived Rohingyas and recorded their narratives to tap into
the current momentum of the Rohingya movement and their issues
since 25 August 2017. Here, I present a few representative cases that
will unveil the ground reality of what is happening with the Rohingyas
in Rakhine State and Bangladesh thereafter. I have tried to pursue four
crucial points of enquiry: (1) Where were they living in Rakhine State?
What was their life like in the state of Myanmar? (2) Why did they flee
Myanmar? What conditions compelled them to leave their home and
homeland? (3) How did they cross the border? How did they get into
Bangladesh? (4) Where do they live now? What is their present condition
in Bangladesh? How do they imagine their future? I am presenting the
138 The Rohingya

English translation of these narratives here as it was recorded without

adding any words, thoughts, or views. It is simply a word-by-word and
sentence-by-sentence translation of what I recorded. I will give my analysis
at the end of the chapter. Let us listen to them in their own voices.

Case One: Sayed Kashim

[Recorded in October 2017]
My name is Sayed Kashim and I am 36 years old. I was living in
Hanjamagon Manupara in Rakhine State. We were a family of 10,
including my 5 children. My parents and younger brother were
living with us, but an older brother who was married had a separate
household. I used to buy bamboo and many household accessories
from Buthidaung to sell them in our village. Besides that, I had cul-
tivable paddy land and I used to do agricultural tasks there. I used
to do poultry farming and did do not have many cattle. My younger
brother had a small grocery shop by a road near our house. I have not
had an education, but I sent my children to a Rohingya school near
our house. By selling paddy rice, bamboo, and home shades, I used
to earn 200,000 Burmese Kyat (BK) per month. By the end of August
2017, the Myanmar military forces had begun torturing the Rohingya
civilians of our area, killing many of our people with no mercy for
children, women, and old people, let alone the youth. To save our
precious lives, we decided to flee from our own house. We tried to resist
having to leave our place, but there were no such opportunities to stay
for a single moment in the village. They started burning house after
house across villages. By the end of October, they had set fire to almost
40 villages. They even set our mosques on fire. We heard of several men
who had been brutally killed and slaughtered with swords and bullets.
Our homes turned into graveyards.
It was evening when the military attacked our village. At first, they
started chasing us with rods and we started running with whatever we
had on. In our neighbourhood, women do not go outside without
covering themselves in burqa. My parents were old. They were not able
to run at that age. My mother fell down and died while running. I
carried my mother’s body to the next village where we buried her in the
first piece of land we found, without proper funeral rites of Islam. How
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 139

could I have left my mother’s body on a strange street? Will one be able
to forgive oneself for doing such a thing? During that attack, I lost my
younger brother too and have no news about whether he and his family
are alive or not. We took some dry food with us and ate it on the way,
searching for a safe place, and crossed the border to reach Bangladesh.
How we reached Bangladesh is another story in itself. By paddling,
we reached Sheelkhali and then crossed it by boat, which usually
charges 10,000 BK for a single person to be ferried. After coming here,
we exchanged BK with the help of some brokers. Then we bought some
food, ate it, and then marched towards Kutupalong. Seeing the other
people, we stopped at a safe place.
A man gave us shelter in their house. He shared his room with us.
For the first two days, he managed food for us. Then we built a tent with
local bamboo and some fabric that cost us 250 BDT so that we could
at least sleep. That helpful and kind man let us use his bathroom and
toilet. Couple of days later, some relief suppliers built a tube well for
us. After coming here, we got 25 kg rice, 1 kg pulses, 1 kg potato, and
1 kg onion as relief provided by some NGOs. We came here one week
ago. We are still living off it. We used to have three meals a day but that
has not happened a single day since we crossed our border. We had
a ration card, which is of no use now. The BM told us to move to the
camp or we will not be fed. However, there was a shortage of space at
the shelter. Though I had never imagined before that I will have to scrap
for food one day, I feel ashamed that life has come to this. We are not
getting proper medical support in the camp. Many of us are wounded
and injured. Thanks to Allah, who sent some people to help us out
for nothing in return. We are suffering at every level, but we feel much
safer here in comparision to Rakhine State. If we can have shelter in the
camp, then we may survive and perhaps we will get the blessings of all
mankind.
The main problem here is shelter. We are also jobless. Who will give
us a job? It is an unknown place. We are scared. If we are able to get
through our present time, then we may be able to make it through our
future too. I respect the government [prime minister] that she allowed
us to stay at this place. No one willingly flees from their place until they
are forced to do so. We were forced to leave our own place just to save
our lives. They told us that we are Bengalis but we are not. We want to
return back to our own country. But if they still shoot at us and our death
140 The Rohingya

Figure 6.1 In many cases, multiple families stay in a single-room house in the
Rohingya refugee camps.
Source: Author’s personal collection.

is inevitable, then we would prefer to die here in Bangladesh and be

buried here as Muslims.
We want to go back to our country, that is, if the government of
Myanmar allows us. If it denies us our home, then we request all the
governments around the world to protest against it and to pressurize the
Myanmar government to take their country people back so that we may
live like you, as you can go anywhere in your region, as you breathe in
every corner in your country. We want our snatched rights back; we want
our seized freedom back. We want to live and die like humans do.

Case Two: Jhinuk Banu

[Recorded in November 2017]
Would you like to leave your own house and stay at another place? You
cannot stay for more than three to four days in your neighbour’s house.
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 141

We had to face a lot of torture from the Myanmar military and Burmese
Moghs. That is why we fled to Bangladesh, fearing for our lives, and now live
in your country. I am Jhinuk Banu, 75 years old. My husband is a maulavi.13
His name is Ismail Haque. We have only one daughter. She is married.
Her husband is also a maulavi. Both my husband and our son-in-law
used to do the same work in the same field. My aged husband retired
soon. Our family was from a good background. We had plenty of land,
farms, animals, and ponds, and we used to help the poor in that area.
We used to help other Rohingyas. The situation changed within a very
short span of time. Now we have to go door-to-door and place-to-place
in search of food. We were happy when we were in our homes. In this
place, we cannot even manage a piece of cloth for ourselves. The situa-
tion got more dangerous after 25 August 2017. If the Myanmar military
saw five people in a group at a time, they shot them dead on the spot.
In the daytime, we had to work silently without making our presence
felt. If they heard us, they would fire at us. We had to switch off the
lights and pretend to sleep in the evening after an early dinner. If they
saw lights in our house, they would fire at us. Babies would not cry in
terror. Every midnight, they would kill someone or the other. There
were midnight massacres, genocide, and mass graves. These became
routine. Civilians would shout and cry out, seeking help from others.
We had nothing to do except tolerate this. Help us! Help us!
In the morning, we heard more sounds of firing, people shouting
and running everywhere to save their lives. We could not stay there
any longer. We moved from one room to another in the house, waiting
until it was night, so that we could escape. It was midnight when we
escaped from our home. Our belongings were scattered in the yard.
My paddy rice was about to ripen in a couple of days and be ready for
harvest. I hope someone harvested them and relished the meal. My
beloved animals were staring at me when I was escaping with my fam-
ily. It was really hard for me and my husband to leave our house, where
we had shared joys and sorrows together and stood by each other all
these years.
We were living in a place called Garatibil. We took shelter in a small
house after escaping from our house that night. We planned to search
for some food in the morning and go to the border area. The midnight
massacre was yet to happen. The military kept firing at us the whole
night. Each one of us was running to save our lives. I have never seen
142 The Rohingya

people running from death. I was old and scared. We ran away from
that village to seek for another and then we came to the border and
crossed the lake to reach Bangladesh through Shahpari Island. Crossing
the lake is costly. They charged us some money. We came to Kutupalong
10–15 days ago. After coming here, we got only 25 kg of boiled rice.
We used the toilets of the locals. We do not get proper medical sup-
port since we are not staying at the camp. There is shortage of food
and clothes everywhere. We saw women begging for food. We do not
beg because we belong to good families. It is not about our pride as
much as about our self-respect. We do not step outside without cover-
ing ourselves properly with clothes. Though we got some saris provided
by local NGOs and local people, the garment remains unfamiliar to
us and of little use. Not being able to take a bath is one of the main
problems we are facing here because more than a hundred people use
one tube well and we feel ashamed to bathe in public.
We cry for our home. Where are we? This place is not ours. We are
not Bengalis. We request to the GoB to help us back safely to our place.
Whatever we lost we will not be able to get back, but at least we have
our dignity. We do not want to lose it even if it costs us our precious
lives. If we get back to Burma, then we may be able to find some work
and will manage to live there happily.

Case Three: Mohammad Ali

[Recorded in October, 2017]
I am Mohammad Ali. I am 15 years old. I have come here from
Buthidaung, Burma. We were living in Gudampara. Including my
mother, we are seven in the family. My father died because of his ill
health many years ago. Then my elder brother took the responsibility of
our family. My father was a day labourer. He used to earn 5,000 BK daily
when he was alive. At that time, my elder brother was in school. My
brother could not continue his studies after our father died. He had
to start labourer’s work. Those days were really hard to survive as we
had to struggle a lot. We had no cultivable land. We had to buy every-
thing from the market. There was nothing for free. The tortures of the
Moghs and the military were a cause of everyday pain for us. When
they began a massive campaign against civilian Rohingyas, we left our
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 143

place and joined others who were about to leave the area. We took with
us whatever we could manage at the time. No one was there to show
us the way to escape. We just joined the group whom we saw leaving
towards the border of Bangladesh. The military fired at us when we were
leaving the area. Many of us were wounded and some died on the way
to Bangladesh. Those who died, we left their bodies on the streets, hills,
and jungles. Many of our villagers came to this camp after we got here.
We heard from them that our house had been set on fire. They killed
two of my friends. The military raped my friend’s two sisters and killed
them. Thanks to Allah that we were able to leave Burma and reach here
as a family.
When we heard the military was firing in the village next to our area,
we decided to move towards Bangladesh that night. After my mother
completed the Magrib prayers in the evening, we took a dark road to
flee. We kept walking at night, and after six days and nights, we reached
Naikhangpara. There were more families who joined us later. My
friend’s family has lots of land. His father refused to leave the place. We
requested him but in vain. During those six days, the military kept firing
at us whenever they saw us. We chose to hide in the caves of the moun-
tains in the forest. Finally, we managed to reach Naikhangpara, from
where we could see Bangladesh. We took the help of a boat to reach the
area safely. The boatman asked us to pay 70,000 BK per person, which
we could ill afford. We had some money which had been sent to us by
one of my uncles who lives in the Emirates, we gave this money to the
boatman after we reached our destination. Those who did not pay were
captured and beaten up by the boatmen. On the island of Shahpari, we
saw the relief vehicles. They gave us some supplies. However, it was not
enough because the number of people was more than the amount of
relief supplies. Whatever we got was managed by my elder brother. My
mother was injured while escaping. Then we came to Kutupalong by
the BGB vehicle. Here, the doctors gave my mother some medicine so
that she could be cured.
We had no money by now and that is why we had to walk several
miles on foot. We slept by the roadside for two nights. We did not find a
tent after getting here. We were in a miserable condition because of the
shortage of tents. Finally, we built ourselves a tent by managing some
bamboo and a cloth drape as cover. We managed some cash and spent
it on the tent. There were four more families with us. When we got here,
144 The Rohingya

Figure 6.2 Common toilets for many households in the Rohingya refugee camps
Source: Author’s personal collection.

there were no facilities of toilet or fresh water. A couple of days later, the
BM came here and set up a tube well and a toilet for us. Now we have
no problems. I like this place. I can play with many kids around here
who are also like me. I mourn for my childhood friends who died in
Burma. I also miss those I have not been able to see yet.
I want to study and become a doctor in the future. I want to serve
the Rohingyas because I have seen many people who are neglected by
doctors and I feel bad for them. My father also died of medical neg-
ligence. That is why I want to be a doctor. The people of this country
have schools and have a good life as well. I want to be like them when I
return to our country. Some days are bad because we have to struggle to
find food. However, we still have reasons to smile here. We feel relieved
that here our lives are not at risk.
I want to get back to my own country without fighting. We want to
live with them as brothers. We do not want to live here forever. Thanks
to the GoB and its raja (the prime minister) that she lets us stay here
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 145

and provides us with food. You have done a really good job for these
helpless people. We want nothing except our own house and human
rights in Arakan.

Case Four: Sabura Khatun

[Recorded in October 2017]
My name is Sabura Khatun (55). I came here in September 2017, before
this I was living in Karanibazar, Maungdaw, in Burma.14 I have two
daughters and four sons. In Burma, we used to live in a bigger and fur-
nished wooden house, but now we are bound to live in this small tent.
We had 8–10 kani15 of cultivable land, one gonda16 of 4–5 kani, and a
wider straw land. To go to our own hatchery we had to pay minimum
10,000–20,000 BK at check posts every time. We had to pay money
even to cultivate our land. In fact, we had to pay to live in Rakhine State
because only money could save our lives. In 2017, even money did not
work and would not have saved our lives.
Our lives in Burma were severely restricted. We could go for shop-
ping only once a week. We were living in a village next to Tulatoli,
which was engulfed in massive violence in 2017. Both my daughters
got married and used to live in Tulatoli with their husbands and their
in-laws’ family. When the military campaign broke out, the military
indiscriminately killed many Rohingyas. The remaining ones started
running here and there from Tulatoli and some of them took shelter
in our village. The villagers of Tulatoli informed us that all members
of my two sons-in-laws’ families were murdered by Myanmar security
forces and Buddhist vigilantes. That was a very painful moment for us.
It was hard to believe, and hence, we were trying to find them, but the
news was reconfirmed by one of the neighbours of the family. After 27
August 2017, we saw many dead bodies and separated organs floating in
the canal. All those bodies had floated down from Tulatoli. Sometimes
we climbed up to the nearby hills in an attempt to see the situation of
Tulatoli from the top and found that it was being heavily destroyed.
Many who took shelter in our villages told us about their horrible
experiences, such as the military and Mogh youth snatching away
children from breastfeeding mothers and throwing them into the fire. If
any mother tried to save her child, the military shot them dead on the
146 The Rohingya

spot. We also heard a lot of terrible stories of rape, killing, torture, and
burning that forced us to leave Myanmar for Bangladesh. Before that,
they besieged Tulatoli, Garatoli, Pukkul (eastern colony), Dioultoli,
and Oyaikkum and murdered the people there. We saw many of these
events from the top of the hills. Then we finally decided to leave our
motherland. We had many cows and goats, which were let go one by
one, because if they set fire to the house, the animals would not be able
to escape and would die for sure.
We noticed that all the people of the colony moved to Bangladesh.
We started our journey from Karanibazar and it took us three days to
reach the Bangladesh border. After walking a whole day, we reached
Zionkhali. Then we came to Kuerkhali at night. On the way, a bridge
was broken, so we had to cross the canal by swimming across it.
We stayed there for a night. There was an empty house and we had
brought rice with us. So, we boiled rice and ate there. In the morning,
we reached the bank of the Naf River, the borderland of Bangladesh.
Then we crossed the river by boat. The boatman charged us 50,000 BK
per head. The amount was not fixed for all. If you have more people
or you have more money, then you must pay more. We had no
money and that is why I gave my gold earrings to the boatman. The
earrings cost 2,000–2,500 BDT (equivalent to 30 US dollars). After
crossing the river, we reached the bank of a hatchery at Lombabil,
a borderland place on the Bangladesh frontier. Then we crossed
a canal in exchange for 1,000 BDT per head. Then we arrived at
Khanchapara from where the BM showed us how to get to the camp.
Then the crowd, including us, started walking towards Kutupalong
old camp.
Local people gave us food for the first two days. When we reached
the Bangladesh border, people gave us clothes, which is what we are
wearing till now. At the same time, some Mulisas (helping persons) gave
us money. They also gave money to everyone in Bangladeshi currency.
Finally, we got some space in one of the temporary camps. We are living
in this narrow space with inadequate facilities. Everything that you are
seeing in this tent has been bought by us.
Here, people call us Burmese Rohingya. In Burma, they called us
Bangladeshi Bengali. In our registration card, GoB calls us Myanmar
nationals, but Myanmar does not recognize us as its citizens. We are
Rohingyas, who have no place in the world. No country or nation
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 147

Figure 6.3 Water supply for Rohingya refugees in camps—one tube well,
many households
Source: Author’s personal collection.

considers us as their own. We are here not by our choice, but by our
fate. We had never imagined that we would ever lead the life that
we are leading here. Sometimes, I ask Allah why he did not take us
away before putting us in this condition that has no present and no
148 The Rohingya

future, only horrible and terrible experiences of being killed, raped,

and burnt.

Case Five: Mohammad Yunus

[Recorded in October 2017]
I am Mohammad Yunus. I am 57 years old. I used to live with my
family in Maungdaw, Burma. I had a lot of land and I used practice
farming on a part of it. I would grow rice and vegetables. I had five
sons and two daughters. Four of my sons were married. They all were
living in Maungdaw but as independent families. They had their
own lives to lead, with different businesses. One of my sons and
both my daughters lived with me. My son, who was studing in class
tenth, helped me with the farming. My daughters knew Arabic. The
Burmese government forbade our children’s education. It was a long
time ago. There were different and strict rules for us. They imposed
embargoes on our free movement, children’s education, marriage,
and all sorts of business. We had to suffer a lot and were treated
as if we were not the people of Burma but illegal intruders. They
used to apply and introduce new rules and regulations; they used
to take away our money and precious things and false cases would
be filed against us without any reason. We had many house-related
problems. They used to renew the license every six months, take pic-
tures of our family, and keep track of our movements. We had to pay
a fee even if someone was to give birth to a child. If someone failed
to give home taxes, they arrested and detained them. One Friday,
torture started under the pretext of some Rohingyas attacking police
posts. Honestly speaking, we had no idea about it. We noticed that
40 motorcycles of Moghs arrived in the village and slaughtered 8
Rohingyas on the spot. Some of them ran away and some were seri-
ously wounded. They were going to attend Jummah prayers, and at
that time, the Moghs arrived and started firing at the Amirs. The mili-
tary was behind all these attacks. They killed innocent people every
day and shot at Rohingya women, children, men, and old people.
One day, they attacked us. They brought some land mines, petrol,
and guns. They set house after house on fire. Bombings and killings
were rampant. We were running for our lives. Four of my sons’ houses
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 149

were in the front. They burnt their houses. Only we know how we felt
during our last few days in Rakhine State.
It took us a day to reach the border because Maungdaw was nearer
to the Bangladesh border. We came to Shahpari Island and entered
Bangladesh with the help of brokers. We had to pay 5,000 BDT for
crossing the river. The brokers helped us with converting our money,
BK, into BDT. We spent it on food and transport. We got many things
and they provided us food and water. They helped us out by giving us
some money too.
We came here about one month ago. For now, we are staying at the
Balukhali camp. We were at Nykhangchari for a few days in the interim.
We stopped there after seeing some Rohingyas building houses for
themselves. Seeing them, we stopped there and bought some bamboos
and material to cover the tent, which cost us 1,000 BDT. We made a
tent there. Then the military moved us from there to a shelter in this
camp. While leaving Nykhangchari, we took those materials with us
so that we could build another tent when we got here. With the help
of Allah, we got a token and thereby find food regularly. The arrange-
ments for fresh water and clean toilets are good here. We never had nor
felt the need to drink bottled water back in Burma. If the Bangladeshi
government would not have allowed us to enter their country, we might
have floated in the sea and died. We are free to go outside and move
around freely here unlike in Burma. We have medical checkups and get
medicines regularly. I never had the chance to visit doctors in Burma.
You could not trust them. Moghs could do anything.
If we were to talk about the future, there are no future plans in sight,
but we do wish to return to our country, to our village. I cannot believe
that my sons are dead. I do not know for how long I will survive. I will
pray for my sons so that Allah can save us from this condition.
We were caged in our own country. We request your government
to make a deal with the Myanmar government so that we can go back
there safely. We want our freedom. We do not want this life. We want
to be accepted by the other people of Myanmar. We want to live there
like the Moghs and other Burmese people. We want to educate our
children. They told us time and again that we are Bengalis because we
are Muslims. This is not true. We are Muslim, but we are Rohingyas.
Though we are Muslim, this is not our place and this is not our country.
We were not born here. We belong to our country, Burma.
150 The Rohingya

Figure 6.4 Inside a cramped tent in a refugee camp

Source: Author’s personal collection.

Case Six: Sanzida Khanam

[Recorded in October 2017]
I am Sanzida. I am 47 years old. I have five children. I studied up
to Class 10 but could not complete my matriculation. Three of my
children have studied up to Class 10 as well. My elder sister went to
college. The others could not go to college because of the restrictions
imposed by the government. I am a housewife. I helped my children
in learning, besides household work. My husband was a contractor in
the wood business. We had a total of eight kani17 of land for cultiva-
tion. We used to produce crops and vegetables there. We were a solvent
family in Myanmar.
In Arakan, we were always alert about military checking and we hid
our young girls to protect them from the soldiers. Physical abuse, sex-
ual harassment, and rape carried out by military soldiers were normal
scenarios that took place frequently in Rakhine State. Besides, their
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 151

target group mostly comprised the poor and ‘illiterate’ rural Muslims.
They used to look for young people to torture and detain, accusing
them of being involved in ‘Rohingya militancy’. The Burmese military
did not consider the Rohingyas as human beings. They were so brutal
towards us. We witnessed that the military soldiers came to villages
in Tulatoli and started firing indiscriminately, following the incident
of 25 August 2017. The military started burning houses in series. We
became very scared of the frequent shooting and burning. We heard
about the attack where about 700 Rohingyas were slaughtered together
in a village, Manupara, near our village. One of my cousins was a resi-
dent of that village. She called us during that time when the military
and Moghs were slaughtering her husband in front of her. Her hus-
band was a maulana, a religious teacher. After her husband’s death,
she fled from there with her children, came to our village, and took
shelter with us.
The military and the Burmese government did not tolerate any
Islamic activities as our religious rituals. They always accused pious
Muslim men of being Rohingya terrorists. They had a tendency to insult
bearded persons in public places. Anybody who worked in schools
or offices could not keep a beard, though it is an important religious
symbol for Muslims. It was mandatory for men to shave off their
beard before marriage, otherwise they would not receive permission
for marriage registration from the concerned authorities. I know many
Rohingyas who were religious and had to shave off their beard in order
to get married. Not only this, as per government direction, a Rohingya
couple could not have more than two children. If they came to know
about a couple with more than two children, they would charge a huge
sum from them. For every newborn child, we had to give them two to
three lakh BK. Then, if we wanted to include our baby’s name in the
cherang,18 we had to give an additional two to three lakh BK. In fact,
we passed our days with so many difficulties and in an extreme form of
uncertainty. We spent a lot of money just to survive. Two of my brothers
live in London. They always helped us in our time of need.
Finally, we decided to leave Burma for the sake of our lives. It took
us 12 days to reach Bangladesh after leaving home. It was a very painful
and horrible journey. We paid 10,000 taka per head for crossing the
border by boat.
152 The Rohingya

Now I am working with an NGO here. My grandson also works with

an NGO. We need money to bear the expenditure of our daily needs
like clothing, medication, meals, and many other things for our family.
In camp life, there is nothing normal here. The relief supplies we are
provided with here are not good enough for eating. So, we need to buy
some fish, meat, and vegetables. Since relief is not sufficient to meet
the needs of our family, we need to earn so that we can bear additional
family expenses.

Case Seven: Muhammad Hafiz

[Recorded in November 2017]
I am Muhammad Hafiz. I used to live at Shudhapara in Arakan. I am
married and have two children. I am a hafiz of the Quran. My father
had the same designation too. I was in Class 7 when I left my school.
Then I concentrated on Hafezi.19 My father was an imam in a nearby
mosque. Then the great opportunity came to me when my father retired
from the job. I got the job of teaching and started teaching others.
Thereafter, the Myanmar government ruled that no one could pray and
no one could take the name of Allah. If they saw five people at a place,
they shot at them. Then the mosques were shut down, so I used to visit
children’s homes to teach them Arabic and often they used to come to
our place. The Moghs and the military used to hate the Muslims. Once
as we were engaged in our daily prayer, we were attacked. They entered
my room and kicked me. They molested my wife in front of my eyes.
They tied me and started beating me and took me with them. They caged
me in a cell and tortured me. There were more prisoners like me, and two
of them had died. The signs of constant beatings were marked on their
bodies. The smell of their dead bodies was intolerable as they had been
left there for decomposing. They used to say we did not give them peace
even after dying. They used to beat me brutally. They broke a part of my
body, particularly the left leg and the left side of my hip. I still remember
how painful it was. After five days, my wife’s brother came with 500,000
BK to release me from the cell. Before releasing me, they beat me up
again and warned me that if they saw me again, they would kill me. On
the very next day, we decided to leave Burma. I had sent my wife’s par-
ents to Kutupalong camp already. I used to talk to them over the phone.
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 153

I did not want to leave Arakan because I felt a religious responsibility to

stand beside the Rohingyas in this crisis, however, I worried about my
family the most.
We came to Bangladesh 12 days ago. We crossed rivers and highlands
and wandered around for five days before reaching the border. Then we
entered through Tambrue border. We faced a lot of troubles. My wife
and I fell sick as both of us had got wet in the rain; my wife had fever.
We expressed our gratitude to Allah after we finally reached Bangladesh
safely. Through the border, we came to a market and the BM took us to
the Balukhali camp.
After coming here, we saw the huge tents that had been built by
others. We managed to build a tent with the help of the military. It is
a very draughty place. Babies keep catching the flu. Yesterday, my wife
got some medicine from the doctor. We have no problem in getting
the token, but for food, we have to wait for a very long time. The toilet
and fresh water are near to our place. Open defecation has led to poor

Figure 6.5 People/kids standing in line to fill drinking water supplied by WFP’s
water tanks
Source: Author’s personal collection.
154 The Rohingya

hygiene. Our tube well got jammed one day and the military repaired it
on the same day. I feel really happy sometimes because I can pray here
and read the religious books loudly without anyone bothering me. No
one beats us or dares to shoot at us.
My future plan is to return to my country. Arakan is our place, to
which we feel a deep sense of belonging. We want to go there and live
in peace. There is a problem of fresh food. I hope Allah will manage
the best for us. I pray for these country people because, in these days,
they were with us. Thanks to those outsiders who helped us by donat-
ing money and food. We are grateful to those who care about us and
express deep concern for us. We request your government to pressurize
Burma to take us back and return to us our freedom and rights. We have
only one wish: to live as a Rohingya till the last breath.

Case Eight: Minara

[Recorded in November 2017]
I am Minara. I am 25 years old. I have three children. My husband
and I used to live in Chadullarh Char in Bawllibazar in Arakan. Our
village was attached to Tulatoli. My husband was a labourer. I used
to live with my parents because my husband was unable to provide
me with adequate food and other essentials. We had a big house and
my father had some land as well some cattle. My husband had some
ducks and chickens. As my husband did not have enough wealth, my
father used to give us his own cultivated crops so that we could sur-
vive by selling them. Those days were good, and we were getting by.
However, the Moghs and the military did not let us stay there in peace.
Without any sensible reason, they started ravaging and torturing us.
They used to steal and snatch our birds. Wherever they saw us, they
treated us as Bengalis, as if we were illegal outsiders. The Burmese
Moghs time and again said, ‘You came here from Bangladesh and
mugged our land and are staying there.’ They started beating us. No
one even dared to step outside their own house. For simple mistakes,
we had to pay huge amounts of money or we would have been killed.
They persecuted the women especially. They took my younger sister
and beat her brutally. They wanted to rape her, however, she managed
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 155

to escape. Our house used to be encircled with a bamboo fence, how-

ever, they removed it three years ago. They used to watch us from the
top of the roof and attack us. We managed to pass our days somehow
but now there are only dead bodies everywhere. The smell of the dead
bodies has left the place sultry and uncomfortable. Of men, women,
children, and old people, none was spared by the military and Moghs.
They just captured and slaughtered them, and buried their bodies in
mass graves. Only 10 people from our area survived, the rest were
either killed or went missing. They beat almost 3,000–4,000 people
from the north side of Maungdaw, labelling all of them as Bengalis.
We had to please them by giving them precious things and cash.
However, in the long run, we were unable to provide things for them
because we did not have that kind of money. We had to live in our
own country like outsiders. All the restrictions were imposed only on
us. To marry someone, people had to give a huge amount of bribe to
the chairperson or the police. We had to get photographed again and
again, visit the office, and wait for hours together. We had to sign on
several different papers. We had to give numerous depositions and
testimonies. It was harrowing and humiliating. It was really hard to
survive. We had to give a huge amount of money even if a childbirth
was to take place. They used to ask 200,000 BK for each newborn baby.
That is how they used to control and regulate our everyday life. We
were doing everything that was asked of us. When it became a mat-
ter of our survival, we ran away from there. They killed my brother
and father. My husband who was with them managed to escape alive.
After we reunited in Bangladesh, he informed me about my brother
and father’s demise.
We came here about 20 days ago. I joined the other members of our
area who were leaving Arakan and it took us eight days to reach here.
We reached Shilkhali by paddle and then we located a boat. When we
were leaving, the military tortured us again. Everyone who was on the
boats got injured. They even seized our gold from us. They cut off some
women’s ears for their earrings. My relative had some money but they
took it all. Moreover, we had to pay the boatmen a huge amount of
money for helping us cross the border. We had no clothes except the
ones we were wearing. When we came here, the people of this area
gave us clothes. We are still wearing those. Then the BGB took us from
156 The Rohingya

the village to the camp. When we were building our place, the military
told us to do it far away from there. We feel cold because of inadequate
clothing and need more warm clothes. We suffer frequent headaches,
fever, and flu. When we visited the nearest medical camp, they told us
to move away. We have tried three times since but they do the same
thing. The medicines given are useless. After we got here at the camp,
we got 75 kg rice and nothing more. We come here day after day to col-
lect a token but have not managed one yet. The majhi, the leader of the
camp, is not good with his words and often delays the scheduled time.
This is why we do not get relief food properly. If we get three meals
a day, then our lives become less miserable. Our kids keep crying for
food. Do something for them, so that we may survive.
I do not care about the future. My brother’s wife and I reached
here first. My husband has not come here yet. We have to find him.
This is another tension. The only looming worry is to feed our babies.
There is nothing more we want. We request the GoB to send us back
to our country safely. We want our rights back. They cannot call us
Bengali Muslims. They will have to pay for the damage. If not, what
will we do? We want back our money, house, and everything that they
have taken from us and then we will go. If they deny this, then we may
have to die here.

Case Nine: Saidul Islam

[Recorded in November 2017]
My name is Saidul Islam. I used to live in the area of Maungdaw
Bagghona with my three daughters and two sons. My sons were
studying in a madrasa. Of my three dauthers, one got married and
two remained unmarried. I wanted my daughters to study but Burma
was not the safest place for girls’ education. So, I could not, in fact
did not dare to, give my daughters proper education, but I helped
them learn the holy Quran. I had four bighas of cultivable land in
Bagghona, a couple of small shops, and a two-storey wooden house
on my own land. The land, some of which I inherited from my ances-
tors and the rest I bought, was used for cultivation by myself with the
help of hired labourers. There were many people, shop employees as
well as farmers who used to work under me as paid workers. I also
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 157

Figure 6.6 Many Rohingyas are doing small-scale business in camps.

Source: Author’s personal collection.

had some people to help my wife in everyday household work. I

had visited Bangladesh a number of times for business purposes
as well as to see my relatives who had crossed the border in 1978
and 1991. I was financially sound and could manage the military
158 The Rohingya

and the Moghs somehow by providing hundreds of thousands of

BK and that is how we were allowed to stay in Burma. I still have a
lot of my wealth in two Burma-based banks. In order to save my life
and my family members, I have spent a lot of money. Nevertheless,
I had to leave my country with empty hands. They had their eyes
on my land and wealth for a long time. They were always afraid
that Muslim rule would establish Rohingya rights as the Rohingyas
were significant in number compared to the Moghs. They did not
let the Rohingyas make progress with their education, economic
development, and social advancement. The Rohingyas were their
main targets. They treated us this way since they did not want us
to develop any social and political awareness in the context of our
rights and entitlements in Burma. As I had some money, I had to pay
a large amount of money, like 100,000 BK, whereas other people
had to pay 10,000 BK, for keeping themselves alive. If choppers or
knives were found in the house during a search, they imprisoned us
for seven months. Therefore, I had to pay them continuously to stop
them from searching my house. In fact, I paid double to live happily
but they ultimately kicked me out. Following the August crackdown,
one night, some military personnel and Moghs raided my house and
looted all the valuable belongings I had at home. They inhumanly
tortured my wife, my sons, and me. My two daughters were saved
because they were hiding in a jungle near our house. My married
daughter was pregnant but even in that condition, she was raped and
her husband was shot dead. I heard that and took my daughter away
from there. There were hundreds of armed military forces around
everywhere and the Moghs were patrolling with swords. I managed
to reach out to some powerful people who helped arrange an escape
route to Bangladesh. I paid whatever they asked for. One dark night,
I left my house, properties, and my homeland with my daughters,
sons, and wife.
We faced no problems walking at night. We saw houses were
burning at a distance. The fires helped us to see the road. We heard
the sound of massive firing. We were walking carefully. Whenever
we heard gunshots, we used to hide and wait for sometime before
walking again. We took the hard way instead of the easier route
because we were scared. My pregnant daughter was having labour
pains. She was very unwell. I carried her on my shoulder. There
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 159

were several Rohingya groups who had taken the same route. Later,
we joined them. The jungle route was the safest. My eldest daughter
and I stayed over a couple of nights with the other victims. I had vis-
ited Bangladesh a couple of times before but never crossed these rivers
and woodlands. That is why I could not recognize the road properly.
I had a sim card. The boatmen took 100,000 BK from us. We came to
Bangladesh through the Shahpari Island. I called up my contact and
he was waiting for us with some food. It is worth mentioning here
that I was able to develop some close contacts in Teknaf through
various forms of small-scale business. One amongst them allowed
us to live in his house. I shifted there with my family. We stayed there
for eight days. We then came to know from an announcement that if
even a single Rohingya was found in someone’s house, the owner of
the house would be sent to jail. I did not want that innocent family
to be harmed because of us, so we moved to the camp. Then I paid
5,000 BK for a place and agreed that I would pay the house owner

Figure 6.7 Organizations and countries supporting the massive Rohingya refu-
gee situation in Ukhia and Teknaf of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh
Source: Author’s personal collection.
160 The Rohingya

500 BDT monthly to stay there. Now we are safe here. I never thought
I would see this day. We share our place with three other families.
We are currently 19 people living together in one place.
I brought a huge amount of money with me while fleeing Burma. I
did not spend all the BK I had because I knew it would come in handy
here. I have always helped others with money and necessary support,
but now I myself have to stand in line for relief. I break down some-
times, thinking of my life in Burma and comparing it with my current
situation. Allah has thrown me on the ground from the mighty sky. I
have not starved for food yet and manage to procure two meals a day.
A couple of days ago, an acquaintance bought a fish and we ate it with
pleasure. The toilet is indeed not usable. Men have been defecating
openly and women are living without proper access to clean toilets.
The nearest toilet is located far from our tent. My daughter has been
unwell. My wife took her to a doctor but they were busy, so they did
not treat my daughter properly. I do not know whether I will be able
to save my daughter. If her condition gets worse, then I will take her to
the hospital. Some brokers are passing through our tent. They want to
kidnap my other two daughters. Good and bad people are everywhere.
I am worried about my daughters’ security. I cannot sleep at night. This
place is intolerable.
If I could manage some money, then I would plan to leave the
camp, but checkpoints have been set up everywhere to ensure that
the Rohingyas cannot move out of Ukhia and Teknaf areas; I know
some people with whom I can do business. I have brought the papers
of my land with me. They burnt my crops, but they could not burn
my land. If I get a chance, I will go back and sell my land in Burma.
I worry about my family. What will happen to them? I hope my sons
will do something for us. I know that the military will not let us move
anywhere, but I also know that I cannot do anything if I do not get
out of here.
Sometimes, I felt strong enough to resist the Burma military but
at other times it was intolerable. We had no arms whereas they were
heavily weaponized. I could not save our houses and lands that I had
achieved through inhuman hardship. I request the GoB to pressurize
Myanmar to accept us and let us return to our place. Above all, we all
want to have our human rights, rights of praying, rights to our wealth
and lives. We want to get back to our country.
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 161

Case Ten: Taiyaba

[Recorded in October 2017]
I am Taiyaba (40) and I have four sons. I used to live in Maungdaw
Shudhapara. My husband was a grocery businessman who used to
sell everyday household essentials in a small market. We had no other
property except for our house on our own land. My husband and I never
got the chance to go to either a madrasa or a school, but we sent our
sons to study, two of them to the madrasa and the other two to school.
Our children were going through everyday forms of discrimination in
school, unlike the privileged Burmese children. Higher education for
a Rohingya was of no use, since we did not get any jobs there. The
Rohingyas were not authorized to do government jobs in Burma. Five
years ago they had formed some rules which stated that the Rohingyas
could only send their children to school upto Class 5. However, even
this allowing them to study upto Class 5 was only on paper, since the
internal setting of Burmese schools was such that no Rohingya child
could survive there for long amidst discrimination, mental torture,
religious humiliation, and frequent racial attacks. Apart from making
school unsuitable for Rohingya children, the Burmese government
authorities instructed the teachers to ensure that the Rohingya chil-
dren remained in the same class year after year. They used to take high
amount of bribe to pass the students in the exams. Those who were
unable to bribe them did not pass the examination. Due to the lack
of financial solvency, many Rohingyas could not even dream of going
to schools. Amidst such critical experiences over the decades, we felt
that it was better for our children to remain uneducated rather than
study with the Moghs in Burmese schools. If we sent our children to a
religious school, they might learn some manners and follow the path
of Allah. Some religious people used to visit our area to teach us about
the religion of Islam and impart religious education. They convinced
the Rohingyas to send their children to madrasas. The Burmese military
closed down several mosques and the innocent maulavis were taken
away; many of them were killed and slaughtered. As Muslims, we used
to wear burqas and never stepped outside our house without covering
ourselves. Moreover, we were not allowed to go outside without an
umbrella. While walking, if the umbrella even brushed slightly against
162 The Rohingya

a Mogh, they used to beat us brutally. We never dared to look into

their eyes. They often lied to the military that we threatened them, so
that the military could torture us. There was no justice for us in Burma.
Even the Moghs’ children used to throw stones at us when we walked
on the streets. We had to turn off the lights immediately after it got
dark. If they saw lights in our houses, they would enter the house and
start beating us. Things made of iron were not allowed in our house
as they considered these as weapons. We used knives and choppers
for cooking. I used to hide them under the ground after using them,
since they searched our houses quite often. Though cell phones were
not allowed, I had one and I used to hide it as well. Once they found a
‘mobile recharge card’ at my house and beat me immediately as pun-
ishment. They wanted to take me with them, accusing me of ‘violat-
ing the rules’ but I convinced them by paying 300,000 BK to release
me. They finally let me go but did not forget to torture me with rifle
handles. In fact, that was what we used to experience time and again.
Then, the 2017 crackdown took place, which was truly unprecedented
and superseded all the previous incidents. They started burning village
after village. They took boys and girls, killed them, slaughtered them,
raped and molested them. Some of them managed to escape but the
rest are either missing or were killed. I saw this in front of my eyes and
that is what compelled me to leave my motherland. In order to save
my family and myself from definite death, I left my home and property
behind. There were several other families who joined us while we were
leaving our country. Among the lot running towards the Bangladesh
border, a girl who was in the later stages of pregnancy, suddenly got
labour pains. She was leaving Burma at this critical stage because she
found no hope of keeping her unborn baby alive here. Despite having
unbearable labour pains, she could not cry out, afraid that the Moghs
and Burmese military might sense her presence and kill her with her
unborn child.
We ran away from there. We walked for miles; it took us nine nights
as we could not walk during the daytime lest we be caught and killed.
Many of us were seriously injured but were still walking to reach the
Bangladesh border. That is how we crossed Shilkhali, one of the entry
points to get into Bangladesh. For travelling by a small boat, we had
to pay 80,000 BK to Bangladeshi helmsmen. People always find their
own way when they are in danger, and so did we. After arriving here,
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 163

we rented a truck by giving 5,000 BDT and the driver left us in front
of the gate of Kutupalong. Many of us could not find shelter in the
camp immediately after our arrival. When my husband was looking
for a shelter and did not find it, a Bengali woman with a good heart
offered to let us stay in her house yard. She provided us food on the
very first day, but from the next day, we started our struggle for the
relief food. We brought bamboos and house shades to build a tent.
Some unknown volunteers came and set up a tube well and a toilet
for us. We received a ration card from some NGO workers, which
confirmed food for our survival. We finally managed to get in the
refugee camp in Kutupalong-1. My son is sick. The doctors gave him
medicines but suggested that we take him to the hospital where we
could get some free medicines for him. The military is forcing us to
not go outside the camp. The camp is already crowded with too many
people. Even though there is no adequate space in the camp, everyday
more and more Rohingyas are joining us, which is also creating the
crisis of food.
We earnestly request the GoB and its prime minister to allow us to
stay here till Burma accepts us as its citizens and takes us back, giving us
our due rights. Though we fled to save our lives, we were indeed forced
to do so; we want to go back to our country because Burma should be
our final destination. We were born there; we want to die and be buried
there.

***

The personal narratives presented in the text show the plight of the
Rohingyas in Myanmar, their extremely vulnerable conditions and
the severe uncertainty of their lives and resources. The narratives and
memories of the ten Rohingyas as stated in the previous sections,
reflecting thousands of similar experiences, clearly demonstrate that the
available theories—bare life,20 precarious life,21 rejected people,22 state-
lessness,23 asylum seeking,24 campzenship,25 slippery citizenship,26
human rights of non-citizens,27 the right to have rights,28 rights of
others,29 state crime,30 and vulnerability31—to understand refugee-
hood, statelessness, non-citizens, human rights violation, vulnerability,
camp life, and asylum seeking become inadequate when it comes to
the questions of the Rohingyas, their struggle for existence and their
164 The Rohingya

experiences of genocide, domicide, and ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.

Such inadequacy thus demands a new theoretical proposition to under-
stand the extreme form of vulnerability, everyday experience of ‘life
and death’, severe degree of atrocity, serious degrees of human rights
violation, the acute shape of humanitarian crisis, constant struggle for
existence, and lifelong battle for survival, and what I call the ‘subhu-
man’ life of the Rohingyas.
The narratives reveal five features of Rohingya lives in Myanmar,
which are symptomatic of my theoretical proposition of ‘subhuman’
life. First, the Rohingyas live in Rakhine State in an acutely atrocious
condition because the degree of atrocities presented in different nar-
ratives earlier was so extreme that life under this condition is not a
‘human life’, but a life of ‘subhuman’. Second, the Rohingyas have no
legal recognition in the state structure. They are neither citizens nor
residents according to the Myanmar Citizenship Law, 1982. There,
they do not enjoy any social, political, economic, and civil rights,
and therefore, their lives are as if ‘worthy of extinction’. In fact, the ques-
tion of legality seems to have made their lives ‘subhuman’, lesser than
that of human beings. Third, the Rohingyas have ‘nowhere to go’ and
‘no one to turn to’ in order to escape their atrocious living conditions.
Myanmar does not recognize them as citizens and Bangladesh does
not recognize them as refugees. Therefore, the Rohingyas have brutal
and horrifying experiences in Myanmar making them feel homeless at
home, another feature of being ‘subhuman’. Fourth, all the narratives
presented earlier unfold the cruel reality that the Myanmar security
forces and Rakhine Buddhists have been given the free license to kill,
rape, and burn the Rohingyas and that is exactly what they have done
since 25 August 2017. Free license to be killed, raped, and burnt alive
makes people’s lives lesser than that of human beings, that is, a ‘subhu-
man’ life. Fifth, a life lesser than that of a human being’s embraces
the aforementioned four characteristics—atrocious living conditions,
lack of legality and recognition, becoming homeless at home, and free
license to be killed, raped, and burnt—but the narratives presented in
the body of this chapter also inform us that the way the Rohingyas
are dealt with is as if they do not deserve to live. A life lesser than a
human being’s does not mean an ‘animal’s life’ because even animals,
to some extent, are treated with some mercy, kindness, and care, but when
I use the phrase ‘a life lesser than that of a human being’s’, it involves
 The Story of the ‘Subhuman’ Life 165

merciless atrocities, unkind brutalities, and an acute arbitrariness. The

narratives presented in this chapter contain every symptom of the
‘subhuman’ life that the Rohingyas lead in Myanmar and, to some
extent, in Bangladesh.

Notes
1. See M. Fineman, ‘The Vulnerable Subject: Anchoring Equality in the
Human Condition,’ Yale Journal of Law and Feminism 20, no. 1 (2008): 1–23; Nasir
Uddin, ‘The State, Vulnerability, and Transborder Movement: The Rohingyas in
Myanmar and Bangladesh,’ in Deterritorialised Identity and Transborder Movements
in South Asia, eds. Nasir Uddin and Nasreen Chowdhory (Singapore: Springer,
2019c), 73–90.
2. N. Kohn, ‘Vulnerability Theory and the Roles of Government,’ Yale Journal
of Law and Feminism 26, no. 1 (2014): 1–27.
3. Uddin, ‘The State, Vulnerability, and Transborder Movement.’
4. See, for details, Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and
Bare Life, trans. D. Heller-Roazen (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press,
1998).
5. Lewis Henry Morgan is considered the founding father of American
anthropology.
6. E.B. Tylor is considered one of the founding fathers of the British social
anthropology.
7. James Frazer is also considered one of the founding fathers of the British
social of anthropology.
8. See, for details, Adam Kuper, Anthropology and Anthropologists: The Modern
British School, 3rd ed. (London and New York: Routledge, 1996).
9. See J. Clifford and G.E. Marcus, eds., Writing Culture: Poetic and Politics of
Ethnography (Berkeley, CA: California University Press, 1986); G.E. Marcus and
M.M. Fischer, Anthropology as Cultural Critique: An Experimental Moment in the
Human Sciences (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1986).
10. See Nasir Uddin, ‘Decolonising Ethnography in the Field: An
Anthropological Account,’ International Journal of Social Research Methodology 14,
no. 6 (2011): 455–67.
11. E. Campbell and L. Eric Lassiter, Doing Ethnographies Today: Theories,
Methods, Exercise (USA and UK: Weil-Blackwell, 2015), 5.
12. Marcus and Fischer, Anthropology as Cultural Critique.
13. Maulavi refers to the imam of a mosque. Sometimes, those who study
in a madrasa are also socially known as maulavis. Here, maulavi indicates a
professional category who work in the mosque and lead the prayer.
166 The Rohingya

14. Rohingya people still use ‘Burma’ in their everyday conversation instead
of Myanmar. Since these narratives have been kept in the original version, except
for translating them into English, I have kept the terms used in their narratives.
15. Kani is a traditional scale of land measurement.
16. Gonda means hatchery, which is used for fish production, cultivation,
rearing, and marketing.
17. Kani is a unit of land measurement.
18. Cherang is a Burmese word that means a form that contains the details
of household members.
19. Hafezi means an expert in the Quran who can recite it by heart from the
beginning to the end.
20. Agamben, Homo Sacer.
21. J. Butler, The Precarious Life: The Power of Mourning and Violence (London/
New York: Verso, 2004).
22. Myron Weiner, ‘Rejected Peoples and Unwanted Migrants in South Asia,’
Economic and Political Weekly 28, no. 34 (1993): 1737–46.
23. Kristy Belton, ‘The Neglected Non-Citizen: Statelessness and Liberal
Political Theory,’ The Journal of Global Ethics 7, no. 1 (2011): 59–71.
24. Alison Mountz, Seeking Asylum: Human Smuggling and Bureaucracy at the
Border (Minneapolis and London: Minnesota University Press, 2010).
25. Sigona Nando, ‘Campzenship: Reimagining the Camp as a Social and
Political Space,’ Citizenship Studies 19, no. 1 (2015): 1–15.
26. Rhoda Howard-Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts, eds., The
Human Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept (Pennsylvania: University of
Pennsylvania Press, 2015).
27. David Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of Non-citizens (USA: Oxford
University Press, 2008).
28. Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt
Books, 1994).
29. Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).
30. P. Green and T. Ward, State Crime: Governments, Violence and Corruption
(London: Pluto Press, 2004).
31. Fineman, ‘The Vulnerable Subject’.
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’
7 Treatment of Rohingyas as Lesser than Human
Beings

T heories are born in social sciences to understand the state of

human life in social, economic, political, and natural settings
across the world. Therefore, theories generated based on a particular
case in a particular regional setting under a particular background and
circumstances could work out for a similar case in a different geo-
graphical region, as well as different histories and backgrounds.1 At
the same time, some special context makes existing scholarship and
theories inadequate and such inadequacy helps generate a new theo-
retical framework for a better understanding of a specific case.2 The
current situation of Rohingyas in the borderland of Bangladesh and
Myanmar has reached a point where, to some extent, the existing theo-
ries for understanding ‘refugeehood’, ‘statelessness’, ‘camp people’,
‘asylum seekers’, ‘transborder migrants’, and ‘extreme vulnerability’
have become inadequate, which I have primarily discussed in Chapter
6 with detailed first-hand narratives of the Rohingyas. Therefore, the
book offers a new frame of thought for better understanding the recur-
rent situation of the Rohingyas and also other people living in similar
socio-economic and political circumstances across the globe.
This chapter pays attention to the people’s ‘critical living
conditionality’, ‘dire uncertainty’, ‘atrocious experience’, and their
‘extreme vulnerability’, which makes them feel that they are lesser than
human beings. I propose this as a ‘subhuman’ life. Many scholars3
have meanwhile talked about such categories of people and come to
The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
168 The Rohingya

the conclusion that the state of statelessness, non-citizenship, and

refugee-hood creates such an extreme living conditionality because
these categories of people do not belong to any state and, hence, can-
not claim any rights or blame anyone.4 The book, rather than looking
at such vulnerable conditions as ‘taken for granted’ for the stateless
people, critically engages with the body of scholarship of citizenship,
asylum seekers, stateless people, and refugees by raising the question:
Are statelessness and non-citizenship the only reasons? The chapter
argues whether these theories generated by academics and scholars
are otherwise rehumanizing the dehumanization process perpetrated
by the states in various forms. This chapter offers a new perspective
to contribute theoretically to the scholarship on the stateless, non-
citizens, asylum seekers, and refugees through critical engagement with
the idea of Agamben’s ‘bare life’,5 Weiner’s ‘rejected people’,6 Povinelli’s
‘geontologies’,7 Weissbrodt’s ‘non-citizens’,8 Belton’s ‘statelessness’,9
Butler’s ‘precarious life’,10 Benhabib’s ‘asylum as the right’,11 Nando’s
‘campzenship’,12 and Arendt’s ‘citizenship is the right to have rights’,13
introducing a new concept of subhuman life. It argues that there are
many people living across the world who hold citizenship and belong
to a particular state, but have had brutal experiences perpetrated by
the state that are even more cruel than that of the Rohingyas. So, the
chapter argues that the reasons for many people being in dire, vulner-
able situations and extremely atrocious conditions in the world do not
essentially lie in the absence of citizenship and non-recognition by
the state but largely depend on the nature of the state and its attitude
towards people belonging to different ethnicities, religions, and ‘race’,
which could make a human life a subhuman one. Given the context,
subhuman could be a framework to understand the acutely vulnerable
condition of people in relation to the nature of the state and its policies
towards the people of religious, cultural, ethnic, and racial difference. It
could also provide a new framework of understanding genocide, ethno-
cide, ethnic cleansing, and domicide. Following my theorization, this
chapter argues that ‘subhuman’ is a category of people who are born
in the human society but have no space in the human community.
They are born in this world, but the world does not own them in any
state structure, and they always live on the margins of life and death.
With ethnographic evidences, the chapter, as the continuation of previ-
ous chapters, proves that the Rohingyas are dealt with, in Myanmar at
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 169

large and to some degrees in Bangladesh, as if they are not worthy of

being human, but some category lesser than human beings, what I call
subhuman, since 1962.

What Makes Human Life a Subhuman One?

Based on my long years of experience in dealing with the literature on
citizenship, statelessness, asylum seekers, transborder mobility, camp
people, forced migrants, refugees, and illegal migrants and theories
regarding these, I have found that the available theories are more or less
closely related to a legal category and hence inadequate to understand
the situation of the Rohingyas living in Myanmar and Bangladesh.
Five basic conditionalities could constitute subhuman life. The con-
ditions could be applicable for both individual and collective cases,
and thereby an individual could be subhuman and so could an entire
community. To some extent, one corresponds to the other, but each
could be distinct case by case. A group of people who experience these
five conditions lead a life as if they are lesser than human beings, which
forms subhuman life. Five basic features of subhuman life are discussed
next, with some abridged bullet points.

1. Atrocious Living Conditions

When people experience an extreme form of atrocity perpetrated by
the state institutions, state affects, and the agents of state that render
the place, area or region unliveable, we may call it ‘atrocious living
conditions’. The role of the state is instrumental here, and therefore,
atrocities committed at a personal level and between people on per-
sonal grounds can not be considered as ‘atrocious living conditions’
since individuals can seek justice from the state or law enforcement
agencies against the person involved. When the state itself perpetrates
atrocities against an individual or a group of people, then it creates
an atrocious living condition because victims have little space for
redressal or possibilities for seeking justice or any sort of remedy. It
should also be mentioned here that it matters little whether the victims
have legal recognition or not; what is important here is how the state
treats them and creates atrocious living conditions. In that sense, under
the feature of ‘atrocious living conditions’, the categories of ‘citizens’
170 The Rohingya

and ‘non-citizens’ or ‘stateless’ and people belonging to the state are

alike. Therefore, atrocious living conditions could render people’s lives
subhuman.

2. Illegal Object in Legal Framework

Legal recognition in the constitutional framework of the state structure
is also instrumental to frame the concept of ‘legal bodies’ and ‘illegal
objects’ in order to understand subhuman life. When an individual or
a group of people are not recognized by any state and are not conferred
citizenship by any state, the person or the group of people turn into
‘illegal bodies’, legally called ‘non-citizens’ and ‘stateless people’. Since
‘illegal bodies’ do not belong to any legal framework of the state, they
can easily become subject to atrocities, discrimination, exploitation,
and even death without any legal recourse, which, to some points,
overlaps Agamben’s idea of ‘bare life’14 since illegal bodies do not
exist before the law. Such a state of being could render people’s lives
subhuman. The concept of being subhuman is sharply distinct from
Agamben’s idea of ‘bare life’ in the degree of understanding as ‘bare
life’ is concerned with people’s position in the legal framework, but
‘subhuman life’ pays attention to the practice and facts about how the
state renders people illegal objects through state affects, practices, and
agents. ‘Bare life’ looks from the ‘top’ but ‘subhuman’ sees from ‘below’.
‘Bare life’ talks about position, but ‘subhuman’ deals with practice.

3. Homeless at Home and Nowhere to Go

When an individual or a group feels that they do not have any space
to live in, any place to go, anyone to complain to, any forum to seek
justice from, any institutions to demands rights from, and any space to
breathe, they could be considered as subhuman. They are practically
homeless at home.15 This is because people do not fall from the sky
or are not born out of the ground, but they are born through the nor-
mal reproduction process of human beings and in a particular place.
Therefore, every human being is entitled to citizenship to a particular
state, which is endorsed by the universal declaration of human rights.16
But the politics of nationalism, majoritarian framework of nation
building, and the unilinear process of state formation in the realm of
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 171

modern state structure have made some people less and lower than
the others, which renders them extremely vulnerable in the context of
social, political, and national space. Under such circumstances, when
people practically feel that they have nowhere to go, no one to turn to,
no space for justice, they become hopeless and helpless as if they are
homeless at home; this category could be considered as subhuman life.

4. Free License to be Killed, Raped, and Burnt

When a group of people are freely allowed to be killed, raped, and burnt
alive without any accountability on the part of the state, people, or the
global community, then the lives of those people could be termed as
subhuman. For instance, it includes situations where state’s agents and
forces are involved in systematic killing, raping, and burning as part
of state policy, and are given free reign to execute whatever they want
as they are not accountable to anybody, any forum, or any institution.
When law enforcement agencies themselves are involved in the viola-
tion of law and human rights through the execution of killing, raping,
and burning without any legal hindrance, the victims’ lives become
less worthy than human life. Therefore, such human beings become
subhuman.

5. A Life of Worthy of Extinction

Every human being deserves a minimum standard of living that dis-
tinguishes human beings from animals. As a human being, everyone
is entitled to food, clothing, shelter, medicine, and education as these
are the fundamental rights of human beings as endorsed by interna-
tional legal framework and international jurisprudence.17 Considering
all this, we presume that all human beings deserve to lead a life with
due dignity, basic living essentials, and a minimal feeling of differ-
ence from animals. When the lives of a group of people become just
a ‘bodily entity’ without having any basic human rights, any sort of
social, political, and economic rights, any form of dignity, any sense of
human living, and any notion of human life, then they become lesser
than human beings. In addition to this, when the state deliberately
designs a policy to drive them out of the country, completely erase their
ethnicity in what is called ‘ethnic cleansing’,18 and commit genocide to
172 The Rohingya

eliminate them from the earth, then their lives become subhuman, as
if their lives are worthy of extinction. The way they are dealt with, as if
they are lesser than human beings, in what I call subhuman life, as they
are worthy of extinction.
The following sections will present, in addition to the ethnographic
narratives presented in the previous chapters, what subhuman life is
and why the Rohingya life is treated as a subhuman one.

People Between Life and Death

A 12-year-old boy, in ragged clothes, was carrying his 3-year-old sister
over his shoulders and walking mile after mile because his father had
been shot dead on the spot and his mother had been raped in front
of him and killed thereafter. He was fleeing with many others who
had had similar experiences. Some of them in the group had lost their
parents or brothers and sisters, while others saw their entire family
being burnt alive. Among the group were two pregnant women who
were walking this long distance with a lot of difficulty, given their
condition. They were trying their level best to keep their unborn
child alive. Two people in the group lost their hands due to military
bullets; four of them were seriously injured and were barely able to
move but were walking with the last ounce of strength left in them. It
seems as if ‘death’ was walking with ‘life’, as many met ‘death’ while
fleeing and the rest left the dead bodies of their near and dear ones
on the way and moved towards Bangladesh. This group of people
finally entered Bangladesh after walking for one day and seven hours,
crossing lands and hills and riding by boat. Mobarak, the 12-year-old
boy, was explaining this horrifying story to me, on 1 October 2017
in Ukhia, about why and how he, along with several others, left
Rakhine State and crossed the border into Bangladesh. Mobarak’s
story paints the picture of a war-torn area where two heavily armed
forces are involved in a deadly battle and the civilians are fleeing for
their lives with their belongings. The Myanmar state forces, along
with some ethnic Rakhine extremists and Buddhist fundamentalists,
were mercilessly killing, raping, and torturing the Rohingyas, looting
their properties, and burning houses across villages in Rakhine State,
which created the scenario that Mobarak narrated to me. Like this
group, more than 750,000 Rohingyas fled persecution in Myanmar in
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 173

hundreds of thousands of groups and came to Bangladesh after an

alleged attack on 30 police camps and 1 military base by the radical
ARSA (about which I have discussed in detail in previous chapters)
and the subsequent military crackdown that started on 25 August
2017. In the name of counter-attack, Myanmar security forces indis-
criminately fired on Rohingya civilians, burnt their houses down,
raped several girls and women, and killed hundreds of Rohingyas
mercilessly; this vividly reflected in many personal narratives of the
recently arrived Rohingyas, presented largely in Chapter 6, as well
as in other chapters as points of reference in order to provide first-
hand narratives. The intensity of atrocities was so extreme that the
global community, including the UN, the EU, the United Kingdom,
the United States of America, and the international rights forums like
IOM, AI, and the HRW, spoke up in defence of the Rohingyas and
blamed Myanmar for its deadly violence, severe brutality, and ‘crimes
against humanity’. I have written about it before in previous chapters
but I am repeating it once again for the sake of substantiating the
theory of subhuman. The United Nations Human Rights Council
termed it as a ‘textbook example of ethnic cleansing’19 where as many
scholars20 and major international media outlets like Al Jazeera,21 the
Guardian,22 the New York Times,23 BBC News,24 and the like, called it
‘genocide’.25 Several development agencies working at the borderland
of Bangladesh and Myanmar to help the Rohingyas, particularly the
wounded ones, old people, underage children, and pregnant women,
have called this one of the most devastating humanitarian catastro-
phes in the history of refugee crises.26 Myanmar’s de facto leader,
and also a Nobel laureate for peace, Aung San Suu Kyi, has also been
accused by the international community and various rights forums
across the world of supporting the ‘genocide’ and ‘the crime against
humanity’ committed by the Myanmar security forces. The reason
why the Rohingyas, often called ‘the most persecuted people in the
world’, have been repressed and afflicted for decades is because of
their identity as an ethno-linguistic and religious minority within the
state of Myanmar.27 Besides, a growing anti-Muslim Buddhist senti-
ment instigated by Ashin Wirathu, a Buddhist monk named by Time
magazine as the ‘Burmese Bin-Laden’,28 has contributed in creating a
hostile condition unsuitable for the peaceful living of the Rohingya
Muslims in Rakhine State.29
174 The Rohingya

The crisis did not appear overnight it has a history of exclusion,

extreme nationalism, and religious fundamentalism, which has been
discussed in previous chapters. The citizenship of the Rohingyas was
taken away by the enactment of the Myanmar Citizenship Law adopted
in 1982, which conferred citizenship on 135 national races excluding
the Rohingyas even though they have been the residents of Arakan,
what is now called Rakhine State, since the eighth century.30 Following
the independence of Burma, now Myanmar, in 1948, the Rohingyas
were about to gain state recognition, but after General Ne Win took
charge in 1962, the military regimes started and continued until 2010
(see Chapter 2). During this period of time, the Rohingyas underwent
brutal human right violations, acute forms of atrocities, severe degree
of oppression, and harsh restrictions in their everyday life due to the
dictatorship.31 The situation reminds the Rohingyas of living in the state
of what I have phrased elsewhere as ‘everyday death’.32 Their lives were
restricted, freedom of movement was cut off, education was halted,
and even marriage became subject to military approval. Particularly,
following the Citizenship Law of 1982, the Rohingyas started living in
an ‘open air prison’, as they were confined to their villages. In 1978, a
severe military crackdown took place in Arakan state that triggered a
massive migration of 250,000 Rohingyas to Bangladesh. The second
influx occurred in 1991/1992 when around 200,000 Rohingyas took
refuge in Bangladesh. Following effective international pressure, under
an agreement between Bangladesh and Myanmar, around 236,000
Rohingyas who fled in 1992 were repatriated, but a large number of
them returned to Bangladesh because the situation in Rakhine State
remained unchanged. Then a big riot between Rakhine Buddhists,
supported by state agencies, and Rohingya Muslims took place in
June 2012, which also compelled around 120,000 Rohingyas to flee
to Bangladesh. In October 2016, 87,000 Rohingyas left Myanmar to
escape deadly military operations. The operation in 2017 is a horrible
example of the atrocities committed by the Myanmar security force,
which compelled around 750,000 Rohingyas to flee and take refuge
in Bangladesh. Of all the Rohingyas who crossed the border after
25 August 2017, 50 per cent are children, 30 per cent are women,33
15 per cent are old, and the remaining 5 per cent are youth. The demo-
graphic proportion manifests the utmost vulnerability of the Rohingyas
living in both Myanmar and Bangladesh. Many reports34 and the
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 175

narratives of the Rohingyas, illustrated in previous chapters, have con-

firmed that thousands of Rohingyas were killed in the Rakhine State by
the security forces. Due to their miserable lives and inhuman state of
living, the Rohingyas have become an ideal example of how people lead
their lives in the presence of ‘everyday death’.35 Many attempts are being
made to resolve the Rohingya crisis, but nobody knows when and how
the Rohingyas will gain a peaceful life with the due human dignity that
they deserve. Therefore, if we consider the situation of Rohingya vulner-
ability and the extreme atrocities they have lived through as just an
outcome of non-citizenship and statelessness, I think it narrows down
the gravity of the outrages and underestimates the intensity of brutality.
This is because the Rohingya crisis does not essentially lie simply in the
absence of citizenship,36 but is deeply rooted in the nature, policy, and
practice of the state towards the people of religious, ethnic, cultural,
and racial differences.

Just Alive Without a ‘Life’

Maksud, a 47-year-old Rohingya who arrived in Bangladesh in October
2017, spoke to me in Teknaf while I was visiting the temporary camps
built for the newly arrived Rohingyas. He said:

Having heard some chaos outside, I, along with my two daughters,

3-year-old son, and 6-months pregnant wife, fled via the back door.
Two days ago, I had seen how the Burmese military and kichu moiggar
foa (few Buddhist youths) were shooting and killing many Rohingyas
mercilessly in the bazaar. While fleeing, we were caught by the Burma
military. They hit me with rifles and I fell on the ground. Then they took
my daughters away, raped them in a nearby jungle, and shot them there-
after. I could not even wait to see what was happening to them as I was
running to save my son, carrying him on my shoulder, and holding my
pregnant wife’s hand. After walking for two days and a night on the hills
and through a jungle, we reached the bank of the Naf River. My wife
was so tired that she could not even breathe. While we were crossing the
‘no-man’s land’, my wife stepped on a landmine and her body was torn
apart in the blast that followed. I could not even recognize her face. I
crossed the border with the other Rohingyas who had had more or less
similar experiences. When I arrived in Bangladesh, I had lost everything:
my daughters, my pregnant wife, my life in Arakan, and my land. I do
176 The Rohingya

not know what to do now, where to go, and how to survive. I am just
alive without a ‘life’.

These narratives manifest some lucid notions of subhuman life that

makes us understand that the lives of the Rohingyas are lesser than that
of human beings. I have recorded many such heart-breaking stories that
stand to argue that subhuman life is not just an outcome of stateless-
ness, but involves ‘state’s crime’,37 an authoritarian approach towards
the people of different cultures and an arrogant intolerance towards
people from different religions and ethnicities.
Saleha, a 37-year-old woman who came to Bangladesh in September
2017, explained to me in Ukhia:
When the military entered our house, they first killed my husband and
my son. I was holding my 10-month-old baby and my 11-year-old daugh-
ter was standing behind me in fear. Then three soldiers raped my daugh-
ter one after the other just beside her father’s and brother’s dead bodies.
My daughter was bleeding and lying on the floor. I was dragged out of the
house and tortured on the yard. They set fire to my house and my daugh-
ter was burnt alive inside. They took my baby and threw it into the fire.
Having seen this cruelty, I fainted and did not know anything about what
happened next. When I came to my senses, I saw two of my neighbours

Figure 7.1 A Rohingya woman who was burnt alive but fortunately escaped
death
Source: Author’s personal collection.
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 177

carrying me with them towards the Bangladesh border. Finally, I crossed

the border into Bangladesh and started living in a temporary camp. I am
now lamenting why I am alive. Am I really alive? Within an hour, my
whole life was destroyed and burnt alive. Why? Are we really manush naki
januar (human beings or animals)? My brutal experience reminds me of
it time and again. Rohingya life is mainshor jibon noo (not a human life)!!

Saleha’s narrative confirms once again that the Rohingyas’ live a

subhuman life.

Critical Present and Complex Future

Khadiza, a 39-year-old Rohingya woman, had just arrived with her four
children the previous night, 23 January 2018, when the first batch of
Rohingya refugees was supposed to be repatriated to Myanmar. I met
her while visiting the Balukhali camp in Cox’s Bazar in late January
and tried to understand why the Rohingyas were still fleeing Rakhine
State when Myanmar was seemingly attempting to bring them back.
Khadiza, with her children, was camping at a roadside dilapidated tent
and was waiting to be placed in Balukhali camp. In response to my
question, she explained to me:
I lived in Maungdaw until the Myanmar military forces and vigilantes
started a massive campaign to kill Rohingya civilians, torture them merci-
lessly, and burn their homes in other nearby Rohingya villages. My hus-
band and I decided to leave Maungdaw for Bangladesh, but one day,
some local government officials arrived in my village and reassured us of
our safety so that we could stay at home. The officials said that nothing
would happen again; the people who have already fled would be back in
Rakhine State. Then we reversed our decision and decided to stay back in
our homeland. However, the next morning, some Myanmar security per-
sonnel came and killed my husband in front of me, gang-raped me, and
burnt my house. Later, I came to know that they were tricking the remain-
ing Rohingyas into staying so that they could be killed in a group. Then,
at night, with my raped, ill body, I left the place with my four children
and walked seven hours to reach here. Bormaya [Myanmar government]
is not bringing the Rohingyas back to give them a ‘life’, but to kill them.

Khadiza’s narrative paints a vivid picture of the ground reality of what

was actually happening in Rakhine State when the process of repa-
triation was in force. Her statement is good enough to understand
178 The Rohingya

the tricks and politics of repatriation from Myanmar’s end and the
underpinning reasons behind refugee Rohingyas’ reluctance to ‘go back
home’. Therefore, the repatriation should not be something imposed
from the top as an outcome of diplomatic agreement, but should come
out of people’s everyday lived experience. In the name of repatriation,
Myanmar is playing with the lives of a particular group of people
whom they do not consider as ‘human beings’, but lesser than them,
as subhuman.
Even though the process of repatriation to Myanmar is appar-
ently in force, new groups of Rohingyas are crossing the border into
Bangladesh on a daily basis. While the representatives of Myanmar are
sitting with their Bangladeshi counterparts and signing agreements
to bring them back, Myanmar security forces continue to torture the
remaining Rohingyas in Rakhine State and burn down their houses
to create a critical condition that compels them to leave their homes,
lands, and properties. The entire repatriation episode, thus, seems
to be ‘a mockery to fool the global community, detract the interna-
tional pressure, and trick with the friendly approach of Bangladesh’.38
Credible international media outlets claim that Myanmar is bulldoz-
ing the land, house, and properties to eliminate the signs of Rohingya
settlement and erase the history of Rohingya existence in Rakhine
State.39 So, the way Myanmar is dealing with the Rohingya issue also
reflects how it looks upon the Rohingyas. Therefore, on one hand the
Myanmar state representatives are pretending to bring the Rohingyas
back to Rakhine State, and on the other hand, Myanmar state agen-
cies are cutting off their food supply to create an extreme situation of
starvation so that the remaining Rohingyas leave their homelands and
flee to Bangladesh.40

‘A Life of Football’: Interpretation of Repatriation

Following a brutal crackdown in Rakhine State perpetrated by Myanmar
security forces, which triggered a massive influx of Rohingyas41 to
Bangladesh during the first four months from 25 August 2017, the
global community started demanding an immediate repatriation, but
majority of the Rohingyas interpret it as a ‘football match’ between
Bangladesh and Myanmar. Amir Hossain, a 59-year-old Rohingya who
recently arrived in Bangladesh, explained to me on 30 October 2017,
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 179

‘A Rohingya’s life is a life of football. One kicks to push in and another

kicks us to push back.’ Another refugee, Zulekha Khatun, a newly arrived
51-year-old Rohingya woman, told me on 21 November 2017 in Ukhia,

We, the Rohingyas, lead a life as if we are footballs. Everybody kicks us

whenever [they] get a chance, but nobody scores and thereby no result.
We live nowhere and do not know where we will go. Burma [Myanmar]
states that Rohingyas are Bengalis, while Bangladesh claims Rohingyas
are Bormaya [Burmese people]. It seems we are like a rolling football
moving from one place to another determined not by us, but by others.

This statement is not an individual’s state of mind, but it reveals the

grave vulnerability and deep uncertainties of Rohingya lives in both
Bangladesh and Myanmar. During the last four decades, the Rohingyas,
who are often identified as ‘the most persecuted ethnic minorities in
the world’,42 have undergone a series of atrocities, systematic killing,
random burning of houses and properties, uncountable rapes of girls
and women,43 and forced displacement perpetrated by Myanmar secu-
rity forces as part of the state’s policy that began in 1978, which made
them think of themselves as ‘footballs’, a metaphor for their vulner-
ability. In 2017, the degree of atrocities was so extreme that the UN
Human Rights Council (UNHRC) termed it as ‘a textbook example
of ethnic cleansing’.44 The rhetoric of Hossain’s statement reveals
the hidden transcript of Rohingyas’ interpretation of the repatriation
dialogue between Bangladesh and Myanmar. On 2 October 2017, the
union minister for the Office of the State Counsellor of Myanmar,
U Kyaw Tint Swe, visited Bangladesh and willingly told Abdul Hassan
Mahmood Ali, the then minister of foreign affairs of Bangladesh, to
bring ‘Myanmar’s residents’ back. Following three meetings, Bangladesh
and Myanmar reached an agreement, signed a deal, and formed a ‘joint
working group’ to expedite the repatriation process45 while the killings
were still going on in Rakhine State. Bangladesh seems to put belief in
the ‘deal’ whilst the majority of Rohingyas do not due to their previ-
ous experiences. Their scepticism came true in a few days when many
credible media outlets published news of forces destroying Rohingya
homes and settlements46 in Rakhine State even after the formation of a
‘joint working group’. These contrasting pictures reveal that Myanmar’s
‘deal’ is a clear political and diplomatic trick to divert global attention
and reduce the mounting international pressure.47 It seems to be an
180 The Rohingya

eyewash to lessen escalating criticism for committing unprecedented

‘violence’ perpetrated by Myanmar security forces, ethnic extremists,
and Buddhist fundamentalists in Rakhine State. What Myanmar is
doing with Bangladesh in the name of bilateral diplomacy is a mockery
to prevent the possibility of multilateral engagement and the interven-
tion of the UN in the process of meaningful and effective repatriation.
Following 25 August 2017, until the beginning of 2019, more than
750,000 Rohingyas fled to Bangladesh and majority of them were
women, children, and old people because many Rohingya youths are
said to have been killed. According to reports from many international
rights forums and the statements of newly arrived Rohingyas, more than
10,000 Rohingyas were killed, 354 Rohingya villages were completely
burnt down, and hundreds of Rohingya girls and women were raped.48
The UNHRC termed it as ‘a textbook example of ethnic cleansing’,
many others49 called it clear ‘genocide’. Due to this ongoing genocide
in Rakhine State, Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto chief of the state, has
also been strongly criticized across the world for committing ‘genocide’
and ‘crime against humanity’50 as she implicitly supported this deadly
violence. In protest of this massive killing, torture, and violation of
human rights, the international community51 and international rights
bodies52 condemned Myanmar and asked it to stop killing and driv-
ing out the Rohingyas, but Myanmar paid no heed to it. Atrocities are
still being committed, though the magnitude is now a bit lower than
it was at the beginning. The migration has not stopped yet,53 despite
huge criticism from every corner across the world except Russia, China,
India, and Japan. There are various forms of global, geopolitical, and
regional interests 54 in the Rohingya issue among the global economic
and political powers and forums, but the lives of the Rohingyas are
in a ‘do or die’ situation. It is an irony that states and leaders in the
global arena still think of their own political and economic interests
whilst people are being killed inhumanly55 and being compelled to
leave the country due to unprecedented persecution. Over one million
Rohingyas, including old refugees and new arrivals, now suffer from
inadequate nutrition; minimum healthcare, sanitation, drinking water
facilities; and bare minimum space of living, which have created the
biggest refugee crisis56 in recent history. In fact, following the adop-
tion of the Myanmar Citizenship Law in 1982,57 when the citizenship
of Rohingyas was taken away, their movement was strictly limited and
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 181

strong restrictions were imposed by the Myanmar state authority on

their education, liberty of making choices, and even the functions of
social institutions. It is hardly surprising then that such experiences and
the restriction of movement have led people like Hossain and Khatun
to use the football analogy to describe the Rohingyas’ extreme state of
vulnerability.
Whilst Bangladesh still expects that Myanmar will finally take their
‘residents’ back, the majority of Rohingyas do not trust Myanmar. They
believe they are being brought back to be killed, not for getting their
lives back. Bangladesh is also not prepared to host Rohingyas for long
and, hence, is trying to send them back at any cost. If this is the case,
what is the final destination of the Rohingyas? Who will finally take
responsibility for them? No one knows the answer. Considering all, the
life that the Rohingyas lead is not what a human life should be, but it
is indeed a subhuman life.

This Is a Subhuman Life: Bottom-Up Narratives

Though academics frame theories based on their intensive reading,
analysis, interpretation, long experience, and deep intellectual inputs,
sometimes some theories are born out of the fields. I also found the idea
of subhuman life in the field as I heard many Rohingyas, while being
interviewed, time and again use the term, ‘egun hono manusher jibon no’,
meaning this is not human life. When they say so, they do not mean that
their life is similar to an ‘animal’s life’ as they say ‘kuttar jibon-o erto bade
vala’, meaning the life of animals (like dogs) is sometimes better than
theirs. So, when I propose the term ‘subhuman’ life, I do not essentially
mean animal’s life, but a life lesser than that of human beings, whose
understanding I found in the field among the Rohingyas. The following
five cases will give us some lucid notions of subhuman life.

Case One: Osman (19)

[Recorded in November 2017]
My name is Osman. I was studying in a school at Burma but had to
leave school before Class 3. We were eight brothers and two sisters.
I had a brother who was older than me. I was the second son of my
182 The Rohingya

parents. Our house is in Daroga Para of Maungdaw. My father was a

daily labourer who used to work on others’ farms. I could not continue
my education due to financial hardship. After I left school, I started
working in others’ plantation farms. I tried to save some money by
doing additional work daily. One year ago, I bought a motorbike with
the money I saved. After learning to ride the bike, I used to give rides to
people for money. I was living with my parents and siblings. We used to
run our family with whatever my father and I earned. My older brother
used to work on the farm with my father. My brother is no more now,
he was shot to death while farming a couple of months before we left
Maungdaw. We did not know why he was killed. We brought his dead
body back home and buried him behind the house. Within a week, the
military campaign started and they began to kill people mercilessly.
When they started burning villages all around, I immediately sent all
my family members to Bangladesh. I dropped them off to the boat
but I went back again. Who will take care of the properties if everyone
leaves? I thought I will take care of it and will bring my family back
when the situation becomes normal, so I stayed at home alone. Day
after day, the situation became worse. They arrested young boys and
killed them brutally in groups. They raped girls and women wherever
they found them. They burnt down houses and properties randomly
as if they wanted to clean the village. I somehow escaped death. I saw
many of my relatives’ dead bodies falling here and there in front of
me. I saw dead bodies lying on the yard, roadside, and in the crop
fields. Their relatives could not even give them a funeral or bury the
dead bodies. Instead, they left the bodies on the ground and fled the
country. After witnessing this deadly situation, I decided to flee my
country. I went to my house at night and took with me all the money
I had saved and started running.
However, I did not have to travel alone. On the way, I met many
people who were fleeing the country and joined them. On several
occasions, the military intercepted us, beat many of us, and plundered
the goods. Somehow, we finally reached the border. Then we came to
Bangladesh by a small boat. We had to pay 25,000 BDT to rent a boat. I
came to Nitrong Para of Teknaf by boat. I have not got the opportunity
to meet my family members in Bangladesh yet because I do not know
where they are. I have decided to go from camp to camp to find them.
The BGB did not prevent me from being docked here. So, without any
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 183

hassle, I have begun my search for my family members from Teknaf. I

have been here for about 15 days and I have no place to live. I go to the
camp to look for my family and then sleep wherever I happen to be in
the evening. The next day, I resume my search again in the morning,
eating what people offer me on the way. Identifying me as a Rohingya,
some shopkeepers cheat me, but some show sympathy as well. I had
everything two months ago but I have nothing now. I have not only
lost my family, property, and home, it seems as if I have lost my past,
present, and future.

Case Two: Payara Begum (33)

[Recorded in October 2017]
My name is Payara Begum. I had six children. Their father was a daily
labourer and used to work in Burma. We were living with our chil-
dren at Rathedaung in Burma. Just prior to leaving for Bangladesh, the
Burmese military took my husband away, arrested him without any
reason, and kept him in prison with many other Rohingyas. I could
not see him. I have heard that they are not being given any food there.
All the people who were going to visit their relatives were also being
imprisoned. Those who paid a lot of money to the military were able to
bring their arrested relatives back. I do not know whether my children
will be able to see their father again or not, whether they will be able
to hug their father and call him ‘baba’. The military and some Burmese
militants started torturing us to drive us out of the country. They started
beating everyone, irrespective of whether they were children, adults, or
elderly. The military also hit my right hand while I was fleeing, which
resulted in a broken arm. It is very painful and I cannot even hold my
baby properly due to the pain. The militants also burnt my small hut.
I had a brother with me to save us, but he was shot in front of me. In
his injured state, he asked me to ‘run away’. I ran away with my remain-
ing strength. After a while, I heard gunshots and realized that they had
killed my brother. Then, I saw my house burning. My brother was burn-
ing inside the house and I could do nothing. They killed both male
and female, elderly and infants. I saw hundreds of dead bodies lying
on both sides of the roads while I was fleeing. It was truly a horrible
experience.
184 The Rohingya

From Halagaga, we walked for four days. I spent the night in the
hills. We were walking without any food, many people died on the
way. My two children walked barefoot. I carried the rest of the four
children on my shoulders. I felt a lot of trouble with my broken hand.
I could not leave my children anymore. Those who were with me also
helped me. Only Allah knows how we reached here. Anyway, I crossed
the border and reached the Balukhali camp by a military vehicle. We
did not need to rent a boat to cross the border. If I had to cross by
boat, I could not come to this side as I did not have a single penny.
With Allah’s mercy I finally managed to get here with my children.
Now I have my children with me, but I do not have any idea about
my husband’s whereabouts. I do not know what the future holds for
my children, my husband, and our life ahead. This is not a human life
as I do not have any idea where to go, and whom to turn to. We are
not only helpless, but also hopeless, as subhuman beings have noth-
ing except a bodily entity (which in Payara Begum’s words: gaa-gotorer
sharir chara morarton ar kichu nai).58

Case Three: Khurshida

[Recorded in October 2017]
My name is Khurshida and my hometown was in Kyandapara in
Arakan state. I have two sons and two daughters. My husband was
killed by the Moghs 12 years ago. He was a day labourer. One day,
some Moghs hired him to carry some goods from a marketplace to
their house. The load was so heavy that he fell down with the goods.
That is the only reason he was shot dead on the road in broad day-
light. Since then, I have been struggling to take care of my family of
four children.
I was born in a poor family and was married to a poor person.
I was not educated, I only learnt how to read the holy Quran. I sent
my children to school. My younger son was studying in Class 10 in a
madrasa in Kyandapara. My elder daughter was 17 years old. She was
married and had three children too. My son-in-law used to cultivate
his own lands. My elder son was married too. He used to live with his
family in Bawlibazar but now I do not know where he and his family
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 185

members are. My younger son and daughter used to live with me in my

paternal house. My husband had no wealth. Soon after he was killed,
I went back to live with my parents. When my younger son grew up,
he started earning some money by taking tuitions, but he spent it all
for his marriage because we had to pay a large sum of money to the
military to get permission for conducting the marriage. We were lead-
ing a heinous life there. I could not visit my own daughter's house.
We were not allowed to step outside our house. Our livestock were
not ours as the soldiers could take them away whenever they wished.
Under the pretext of search, the soldiers quite often raided my house
and many times stripped me and my daughter. This was the story of
all the Rohingyas living there. In fact, we had to take their permission
before taking every breath.
One day, some military personnel came to our house looking for
my young son. They kicked me on my head. My little daughter was
hiding in a corner of the room, but they molested her. Whenever I
requested them to leave her, they kicked me. The floor was bloodied
with my daughter’s chastity. There were eight people who raped her
one by one. Then they cut her head off her body and left her on the
ground. I could not bear the scene and lost consciousness. I do not
know for how long I remained unconscious. When I returned to my
senses, I saw that they had set fire to my house. Some villagers car-
ried my half-conscious body out of there. After coming out, I started
looking for my son. I asked everyone but they were busy running to
save their lives. Soon I came to know that my son had been with the
other students of the madrasa and the military had shot every one
of them and taken away their bodies. I was left speechless and was
wailing loudly. Later, I joined other people who were leaving their own
country and going towards the border of Bangladesh.
Finally, I came to Bangladesh with many other Rohingyas who had
had more or less similar experiences. I am still seriously traumatized
and cannot do anything properly. Time and again, the horrible scenes
of my daughter’s death come to my mind and my eyes carry the experi-
ence of witnessing this brutal event in my life. I could not even see my
son’s face for one last time. I cannot imagine how people can behave
so inhumanly with us. It is indeed because the Burmese military and
Moghs do not consider the Rohingyas as human beings.
186 The Rohingya

Case Four: Ameen

[Recorded in November 2017]
I am Ameen. I used to live in Aiyendapara in Rakhine State. I had four
sons and two daughters. Including my sons’ wives and their children,
I had 13 members in my family. We had our own house on our own
land. We had four buffaloes and chickens and ducks as well. Also, we
had several bighas of cultivable land. My sons used to practice agricul-
ture and horticulture on their lands. We were happy with whatever we
had but perhaps destiny was not on our side. We were living like pris-
oners in our house and soon it turned into a cage for us. The Myanmar
military forces were patrolling outside our village. They had even taken
away our rights to call our own Allah. How pathetic it was! They were
searching our house almost every day. They were imposing new rules
to restrict our movements. People [the Rohingyas] even had to seek
their [Myanmar military’s] permission before getting married. They
took away our security by destroying the protecting fence and block-
ages that I set up at my own cost. One day they suddenly found some
Burmese policemen’s bodies and blamed us for killing them. Then,
another time, they came to our area and started beating our children
and youths. At that moment, two of my sons were in the house and the
other two were outside. Suddenly, a group of soldiers entered our house
and started beating the women: my wife, daughters, daughters-in-law,
and granddaughters. Some Mogh youths also joined the military forces
in beating us. My youngest son protested, so they hit him with a sword
and slaughtered him in front of me. After his death, they fired at his
dead body. The Moghs snatched our precious jewellery and beat us bru-
tally. They forcibly raped my granddaughter and one of my daughters
in front of our eyes. My granddaughter was only 12 years old. Then they
hanged them nude on a tree. They did not even spare the kids and new-
born babies in our family. They killed my eldest son mercilessly. While
leaving, they set fire to our house. We managed to escape the place but
some parts of my back were burnt. I never left my children alone at the
house when they were alive but I had to leave their dead bodies in that
situation to save the rest of the members of my family.
How we came here is another painful story. We came here through
paddle walking. We mainly walked in the night and hid during the day.
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 187

We had a lot of people with us. Once we heard the sound of open firing
nearby, we scattered and hid ourselves. We saw scattered parts of human
bodies everywhere on the ground. While crossing the lake, we saw dead
bodies floating in the water. Only our Allah knows how we were saved
by his grace. At last, we reached Bangladesh by crossing Naiongkhdia
by boat through Shahpari Island. Now I live in Kutupalong camp and
all sorts of necessary food and daily essentials are provided to us. My
whole life has been destroyed by the Burmese military.

Case Five: Salma Begum

[Recorded in October 2017]
My name is Salma and I am 21 years old. I got married five years ago.
My husband’s name is Mohammed Majid. My husband was involved
in the pottery business. I had two daughters and one son. We had
poultry chicken at home. There was some land behind our house
where we used to cultivate vegetables. We used to buy the rest of the
things from the market. We used to stay in Kilmudong in Burma. My
children used to go to school and moktob59 in our locality. We fled
from Burma and came to Bangladesh because the Burmese Moghs
and the military were torturing us randomly. The military attacked
our village over and over again. They had stopped our food supply
for the last two months that we were there. We survived for some
time with whatever we had at home. People from nearby villages were
killed brutally and their houses were burnt down. We were looking
for a suitable and safe day to flee, but they attacked our village one
day. They took my husband away and tied him with many others in
the village. They kicked them inhumanly, shot them, and killed them
in groups, one after the other. Those who cried out with pain were
shot a second time and killed immediately. After that, they lined up
all the village girls in one place. Those who had little babies/children
with them were put in the same line but their babies were snatched
away and shot in front of the mothers. My children were also among
them: one of my sons and two daughters were shot to death on the
spot in front of me. Then they separated the women as per their
choice to another place. They beat them and raped them there. They
took me too. Four soldiers and Moghs raped me one after another.
188 The Rohingya

Then I fainted. I do not know what happened next. When I gained

consciousness, I saw that my body was covered with blood. I felt very
weak but got up somehow and hid myself in the forest. I was hiding
in the forest for three days. After three days, I reached Nappua by a bus
along with others. From there, I crossed the border by boat. I had a lot
of hope that I would find my husband but I did not. I lost my babies
and my husband. I do not know why Allah has kept me alive. The way
the Burmese military and the Moghs dealt with us, it reminds us of
our position in the human society, as if we are not human beings but
lesser than them.

***

Based on these cases of extreme vulnerability and endless uncertainty,

we could say that the Rohingya life is truly a ‘bare life’60 and a life of
‘rejected people’,61 or that they lead a ‘precarious life’.62 But I prefer to
call it subhuman life because the life that the Rohingyas lead is a life
lesser than that of human beings. As I have already explained before,
‘subhuman’ is a category of people who are born in the human society,
but have no space in the human community. Subhuman people do not
receive the treatment that a human deserves , nor do they lead the life of
a human being. Subhumans are born in the world, but the world does
not own them in any state structure. Subhuman people are treated as
o-manush (non-human) since they do not exist in the legal framework
of any state. Subhumans are a particular category of people living in
the borderland of life and death. Subhumans are not treated as human
or given their due dignity, rights, and voice; they are dealt with as if
they are lesser than human beings. The cases presented earlier clearly
demonstrate that: (1) the Rohingyas have atrocious living conditions;
(2) they have no legal recognition; (3) they are homeless at home as
they have nowhere to go and no one to turn to; (4) they are allowed
to be killed, raped, and burnt with free license; and (5) they lead a life
full of uncertainty and extreme vulnerability as if they do not deserve
a human life, as if their lives are lesser than that of human beings. The
current Rohingya situation successfully fulfils the five conditions by
which the Rohingyas could be identified as subhuman.
Citizenship scholars quite often justify the extreme vulnerability
and severe uncertainty as ‘taken for granted’ due to non-citizenship
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 189

and statelessness, because as Arendt claims, citizenship is the right

to have [other] rights63 and as Goncalo Matias said ‘citizenship is a
human right’.64 But I argue that there are hundreds and thousands of
people living across the world who possess citizenship and thereby
belong to a particular state but experience everyday forms of discrim-
ination, arbitrary persecution, human rights violation, acute forms
of atrocities, and majoritarian domination where the roles of the
state are at the centre. Therefore, non-citizenship and statelessness
are not the only reasons behind the production of vulnerability and
uncertainty, but the nature of the state and the state’s perspectives
towards people of cultural, religious, and racial differences are the
governing factors. The Rohingyas, therefore, are in a state of acute
vulnerability and endless uncertainty because of the nature of
the state (militarized and majoritarian) and its approach towards the
people of ethnic (Rohingya versus Burman), religious (Islam versus
Buddhist), and racial (South Asian origin versus Southeast Asian
ones) differences.

Notes
1. See Daniel W. Rossides, Social Theory: Its Origins, History, and Contemporary
Relevance (New York: General Hall, Inc, 1998).
2. See Matt Dawson, Social Theory for Alternative Societies (London, New
York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016).
3. Particularly, Hannah Arendt and Seyla Benhabib have talked about
citizenship rights in relation to the absence of other forms of rights. See, for
details, Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt
Books, 1994); Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).
4. See Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle
for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b).
5. Giorgio Agamben, Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life, trans. by D.
Heller-Roazen (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998).
6. Myron Weiner, ‘Rejected Peoples and Unwanted Migrants in South Asia,’
Economic and Political Weekly 28, no. 34 (1993): 1737–46.
7. Elizabeth Povinelli, Geontologies: A Requiem to Late Liberalism (Durham:
Duke University Press, 2016).
8. David Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of Non-citizens (USA: Oxford
University Press, 2008).
190 The Rohingya

9. Kristy Belton, ‘The Neglected Non-citizen: Statelessness and Liberal

Political Theory,’ The Journal of Global Ethics 7, no. 1 (2011): 59–71.
10. J. Butler, The Precarious Life: The Power of Mourning and Violence (London/
New York: Verso, 2004).
11. Benhabib, The Rights of Others.
12. Sigona Nando, ‘Campzenship: Reimagining the Camp as a Social and
Political Space,’ Citizenship Studies 19, no. 1 (2015): 1–15.
13. Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism.
14. See Agamben, Homo Sacer.
15. I have borrowed the idea of ‘homeless at home’ from my dissertation
that I wrote about the indigenous people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Though
both cases are completely different, the idea of ‘homeless at home’ seems very
effective here. See Nasir Uddin, ‘Homeless at Home: An Ethnographic Study
on the Marginality and Leadership among the Khumi in the Chittagong Hill
Tracts of Bangladesh’ (unpublished PhD dissertation, Kyoto University, Kyoto,
2008).
16. See United Nations General Assembly, Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, New York (1948). Also see for detail, Weissbrodt, The Human Rights of
Non-citizens.
17. See United Nations General Assembly, Universal Declaration of Human
Rights. See also Michael K. Addo, The Legal Nature of International Human Rights
(Leiden and Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 2010).
18. See Nasir Uddin, ‘Ethnic Cleansing of the Rohingya People,’ in The
Palgrave Handbook of Ethnicity, ed. S. Ratuva (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan,
2019a); Penny Green, Thomas MacManus, and Alicia de la Cour Venning,
Countdown Annihilation: Genocide in Myanmar (London: International State
Crime Initiative, 2015); Maung Zarni and Alice Cowley, ‘Slow-Burning
Genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingyas,’ Pacific Rim Law & Policy Journal 23, no. 3
(2014): 683–754.
19. Michael Safi, ‘Myanmar Treatment of Rohingya Looks like “Textbook Ethnic
Cleansing”, says UN,’ Guardian, 11 September 2017, accessed 28 October 2018,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/11/un-myanmars-treatment-
of-rohingya-textbook-example-of-ethnic-cleansing.
20. Zarni and Cowley, ‘Slow-Burning Genocide of Myanmar’s Rohingyas’;
Green, Thomas, and Venning, Countdown Annihilation; Azeem Ibrahim, The
Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide (London: Hurst & Company, 2016).
21. Al Jazeera, ‘The Hidden Genocide,’ 16 January 2013, accessed 28 October
2018, https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeerainvestigates/2012/12/
2012125122215836351.html.
22. S. Tisdall, ‘World’s Awkward Silence over Rohingya Genocide
Warnings,’ Guardian, 3 January 2018, accessed 28 October 2018, https://www.
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 191

theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/03/worlds-awkward-silence-over-rohingya-
genocide-warnings.
23. N. Kristof, ‘I Saw a Genocide in Slow Motion,’ New York Times, 2 March 2018,
accessed 28 October 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/02/opinion/
i-saw-a-genocide-in-slow-motion.html.
24. British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), ‘Myanmar Rohingya: UN Says
Military Leaders Must Face Genocide Charges,’ 27 August 2018, accessed 28
October 2018, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-45318982.
25. See Uddin, ‘Ethnic Cleansing of the Rohingya People.’
26. Monkey Cage, ‘There’s a Massive Humanitarian Crisis in Bangladesh’s
Rohingya Refugee Camps,’ Washington Post, 12 October 2017, accessed 2 April
2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/10/12/
theres-a-massive-humanitarian-crisis-in-bangladeshs-rohingya-refugee-
camps/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.21b98f13af76.
27. Ibrahim, The Rohingyas; K. Fahmida Farzana, Memories of Burmese
Rohingya Refugees: Contested Identities and Belonging (London: Palgrave
MacMillan, 2017); Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga.
28. See ‘The Face of Buddhist Terror’, Time, 1 July 2013, accessed 17 March
2019, http://content.time.com/time/covers/europe/0,16641,20130701,00.
html.
29. Marella Oppenheim, ‘”It Only Takes One Terrorist”: The Buddhist Monk
Who Reviles Myanmar’s Muslims,’ Guardian, 12 May 2017, accessed 17 March
2019, https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/may/12/only-
takes-one-terrorist-buddhist-monk-reviles-myanmar-muslims-rohingya-
refugees-ashin-wirathu.
30. See Chapters 1 and 2 of this book.
31. See Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga; Nasir Uddin, The Voices of
the Victims: The “Subhuman” Life of the Rohingya (An unpublished research
monograph on the Rohingya victims of 2017 campaign in Rakhine State,
2019d).
32. Nasir Uddin, ‘Life in Everyday Death: The Rohingyas in Bangladesh
and Myanmar,’ Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs, Georgetown
University, 19 October 2017a, accessed 25 April 2008, https://berkleycenter.george-
town.edu/responses/life-in-everyday-death-the-rohingyas-in-bangladesh-
and-myanmar.
33. Of 30 per cent women, around 30,000 were rape victims and
were pregnant, they gave birth to 16,000 babies within one year of their arrival
in Bangladesh. See UNICEF News, ‘More than 60 Rohingya Babies Born
in Bangladesh Refugee Camps Every Day,’ accessed 31 March 2019, https://
www.unicef.org/press-releases/more-60-rohingya-babies-born-bangladesh-
refugee-camps-every-day-unicef.
192 The Rohingya

34. Max Bearak, ‘Aid Group Says at Least 6,700 Rohingya Were Killed in
Burma in First Month of “Ethnic Cleansing”,’ Washington Post, 14 December
2017, accessed 31 March 2019, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/world-
views/wp/2017/12/14/aid-group-says-at-least-6700-rohingya-killed-in-burma-
in-first-month-of-ethnic-cleansing/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5e451a6daa1a.
35. Uddin, ‘Life in Everyday Death’.
36. For details, see Cresa L. Pugh, ‘Is Citizenship the Answer? Construction
of Belonging and Exclusion for the Stateless Rohingya of Burma’ (Working
Paper No. 107, International Migration Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford,
2013).
37. P. Green and T. Ward, State Crime: Governments, Violence and Corruption
(London: Pluto Press, 2004).
38. Nasir Uddin, ‘Ongoing Rohingya Repatriation Efforts Are Doomed to
Failure!’ Opinion, Al Jazeera, 22 November 2018a, accessed 31 March 2019,
https://www.academia.edu/37831623/Ongoing_Rohingya_repatriation_
efforts_are_doomed_to_failure_.
39. Shoon Naing, ‘Bulldozing Rohingya Villages Was Not “Demolition
of Evidence”, Myanmar Official Says,’ Reuters, 26 February 2008, accessed 20
March 2018 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-rohingya-enterprise/
bulldozing-rohingya-villages-was-not-demolition-of-evidence-myanmar-
official-says-idUSKCN1GA0VH.
40. Liam Cochrane, ‘Rohingya Crisis: Calculated Food Shortages
Driving Exodus from Myanmar: Rights Groups Say,’ ABC NEWS, 18 October
2017, accessed 20 March 2018, http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-18/
rohingyas-driven-from-myanmar-by-food-shortage-rights-groups-say/9060076.
41. The United News of Bangladesh (UNB), ‘UN: New Rohingya Arrivals
from Myanmar Now 646,000,’ Dhaka Tribune, 9 December 2017, accessed
2 January 2018, http://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2017/12/09/
un-rohingya-arrival-bangladesh/.
42. Amnesty International, ‘Who Are the Rohingyas? What Is Happening
in Myanmar?,’ 26 September 2017, accessed 26 December 2017, https://www.
amnesty.org.au/who-are-the-rohingya-refugees/.
43. The United News of Bangladesh (UNB), ‘Rohingya Women Gang-
Raped by Myanmar Army,’ Daily Star, 13 November 2017, accessed 26 January
2018, https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/rohingya-girls-gang-raped-
myanmar-army-1490278.
44. The United Nations News, ‘UN Human Rights Chief Points to “Textbook
Example of Ethnic Cleansing” in Myanmar,’ Global Perspective on Human
Stories, 11 September 2017, accessed 27 January 2018, https://news.un.org/en/
story/2017/09/564622-un-human-rights-chief-points-textbook-example-ethnic-
cleansing-myanmar#.Wj4_SZugeM8OperaStable\Shell\Open\Command.
 Theorizing ‘Subhuman’ 193

45. Associated Press, ‘Myanmar, Bangladesh Set Up Working Group for

Rohingya Return,’ Fox News Channel, 19 December 2017, accessed 26 January
2018, http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/12/19/myanmar-bangladesh-set-
up-working-group-for-rohingya-return.html.
46. Deautsche Welle, ‘Myanmar Continues to Destroy Rohingya Villages,’ 18
December 2017, accessed 20 March 2018, http://www.egyptindependent.com/
myanmar-continues-destroy-rohingya-villages-hrw/.
47. See, Uddin, Nasir. ‘Ongoing Rohingya Repatriation Efforts Are Doomed
to Failure!’.
48. Nasir Uddin, ‘Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Five Challenges for the
Future,’ LSE South Asia (Blog), 21 November 2018b, accessed 31 March 2019,
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/southasia/2018/11/21/rohingya-refugees-in-bangladesh-
five-challenges-for-the-future/.
49. Penny Green, Thomas MacManus, Alicia de la Cour Venning, Azeem
Ibrahim, Maung Zarni, Ashley Starr Kinseth, and others.
50. Shoon Naing, ‘Rights Group Accuses Myanmar of Crimes against
Humanity,’ Reuters, 26 September 2017, accessed 25 January 2018, https://
www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-rohingya/rights-group-accuses-
myanmar-of-crimes-against-humanity-idUSKCN1C10MR.
51. For example, the UN, EU, OIC, and the like.
52. For example, the AI and HRW.
53. Serajul Quadir, ‘Rohingya Refugees Still Fleeing From Myanmar
to Bangladesh: UNHCR,’ US NEWS, 7 December 2017, accessed 22
December 2017, https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-12-07/
rohingya-refugees-still-fleeing-from-myanmar-to-bangladesh-unhcr.
54. Matteo Fumagalli, ‘How Geopolitics Helped Create the Latest
Rohingya Crisis,’ The Conversation, 21 September 2017, accessed 25 January 2018,
https://theconversation.com/how-geopolitics-helped-create-the-latest-rohingya-
crisis-84309.
55. Uddin, ‘Life in Everyday Death’.
56. Sarah Wildman, ‘The World’s Fastest-Growing Refugee Crisis is Taking Place
in Myanmar,’ VOX News, 18 September 2017, accessed 9 April 2018, https://www.
vox.com/world/2017/9/18/16312054/rohingya-muslims-myanmar-refugees-
violence.
57. ‘Myanmar Citizenship Law’, United Nations Action for Cooperation
against Trafficking in Persons (UN-ACT), accessed 22 January 2018, http://un-
act.org/publication/view/myanmars-citizenship-law-1982/.
58. The literal meaning of the sentence is: we simply have flesh and bones in
our body, nothing else. The actual meaning is that we have no human dignity,
no legal entity, no desires, no hopes, and no future.
59. A school for Islamic education, similar to a madrasa.
194 The Rohingya

60. Agamben, Homo Sacer.

61. Weiner, ‘Rejected Peoples and Unwanted Migrants in South Asia’.
62. Butler, The Precarious Life.
63. Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism.
64. Goncalo Matias, Citizenship as a Human Right: The Fundamental Rights to
a Specific Citizenship (Singapore: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016).
 Conclusion
8 Looking Forward

A nthropologists often face one common question when they write

about a problematic issue: What is the solution? I do feel that ‘selling
a solution’ or ‘giving a prescription’ to resolve a problem is not the
duty of ethnographers, though they uphold a strong sense of commitment
towards their object of study. An ethnographer could provide a detailed
description,1 deep insights, relatively objective scenarios, vivid narratives,
‘joint product’,2 and ground reality good enough to understand a
particular group of people, society, culture, a problem, an issue, or a fact.
‘Understanding society is over, now the time is to change’3 could be
applicable to some extent, but I feel it is still important to keep an intellectual
distance between academia and activism,4 because academia demands
a relatively objective position while activism holds a clear subjective
repositioning.5 Therefore, policy prescription is not always a task for
ethnography, but with their first-hand and comprehensive experience,
ethnographers could contribute substantially to the policy formation
in order to resolve the problem. Nonetheless, as an ethnographer, I
feel an intellectual discomfort and academic uneasiness in discussing
policy issues, since discussion regarding a sustainable solution for the
Rohingya situation involves policy analysis. Rather, I am deeply inter-
ested in understanding the situation from the bottom, from the perspec-
tive of the people involved, so that a good number of vivid narratives
unfold what is happening in Myanmar and Bangladesh as far as the
current state of the Rohingyas is concerned. However, anthropologists
The Rohingya. Nasir Uddin, Oxford University Press (2020). © Oxford University Press.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780199489350.001.0001.
196 The Rohingya

are often accused of avoiding the factual realities and being reluctant in
addressing practical problems. I also feel that based on my long years of
involvement with the Rohingya research and decade-long engagement
with the Rohingya issues, I need to reflect on how to resolve the problem
and think about effective strategies for a durable solution to the
Rohingya crisis. Unfortunately, this is not a crisis that can be resolved
within a short span of time, the reasons for which I will discuss in the
later sections of this chapter.
This chapter sheds light on the potential solutions to the Rohingya
refugee situation6 with a critical examination of the roles of regional
political dynamics, South and Southeast Asian geopolitics, bilateral and
multilateral interstate relations, and the role of the global community.7
Following the latest influx that started in August 2017, the local,
national, regional, and international partners and well-wishers, jour-
nalists, experts, scholars, and the international community—like the
UN (and its other organs like UNHCR, UNICEF, UNHRC), IOM, ILO,
EU, AI, HRW, OIC, the United Kingdom, the United States of America,
and the Arab League—are calling for a lasting solution to the Rohingya
problem. This chapter raises questions of solution for whom (for the
Rohingyas who are not problem creators), solution by whom (by the
international community that cannot create any meaningful pressure
on Myanmar to halt persecution), and for what (for bringing Rohingyas
back whereas Rakhine State and its people are not ready to accept them
at any cost). Finally, this chapter attempts to explain some practical
issues stemming from the ground reality through ethnographic studies
about how the Rohingyas themselves think of changing the vulnerable
and miserable conditions of their lives in Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Life after Migration

Following an all-out campaign by Myanmar security forces, some
ethnic extremists, and some Buddhist fundamentalists against the civilian
Rohingyas of Northern Rakhine State in 2017, the Rohingya situation has
taken an alarming shape both in Myanmar and Bangladesh: a genocidal
situation in Myanmar and a humanitarian situation in Bangladesh.
Following the recent influx, 750,000 more Rohingya refugees have
entered Bangladesh in addition to the existing 500,000–550,000.
 Conclusion 197

However, Bangladesh is not ready to host such a large number of Rohingyas

on its land. Therefore, the newly arrived Rohingyas have fallen into a
serious crisis as they are unable to meet even their basic needs, which
has created new tensions between the old and new Rohingya refugees.
Combining the old refugees and the new arrivals, more than one mil-
lion Rohingyas are suffering from inadequate food and nutrition, lack
of proper healthcare, substandard sanitation, shortage of drinking
water, and lack of bare minimum space for living; this has created an
acute humanitarian crisis from the late 2017. Therefore, this is now con-
sidered as the worst refugee crisis in recent history8 and a ‘humanitarian
disaster of historic proportion’.9 At the beginning of the Rohingya crisis,
particularly in 2017, donor countries supported them by providing
food, medicine, and cash and by building temporary shelters, but all
this has gradually reduced, which has created a mounting crises of host-
ing more than one million Rohingya people.10 Now, it is a big challenge
for Bangladesh to ensure the supply of adequate food, basic medical
facilities and healthcare, education for the children, proper sanitation
facilities, clean drinking water, and a minimum standard of housing.
Security issues are also becoming a major concern since women traffick-
ing, child trafficking, and recruitment in militant activities have already
become news items11 since vulnerable conditions can easily be exploited
by any vested interest groups.12 All these symptoms reveal that after
migration to Bangladesh, the Rohingyas are in a relatively safer posi-
tion than they were in Myanmar in terms of life-threatening situations.
However, they are now in a new domain of vulnerability. Bangladesh
is hosting a large number of Rohingyas on humanitarian grounds and
under serious international pressure, but this will not last long under
any circumstances because there is a growing dissatisfaction and rising
anti-Rohingya sentiment among the general public in Bangladesh.13
Besides, the local communities are gradually becoming intolerant of
the Rohingyas day by day. This intolerance could turn into violence
at any point of time. Therefore, the life of the Rohingyas after migra-
tion to Bangladesh has taken a new shape of dire uncertainty and acute
vulnerability. Besides, Bangladesh is trying to repatriate the Rohingyas
to Myanmar as soon as possible at any cost, which is completely under-
standable, but the situation in Myanmar is not favourable for their
safe return. Therefore, the repatriation process could create another
vulnerable condition for the Rohingyas, as discussed in Chapter 7.
198 The Rohingya

Given the context, until Myanmar is prepared to bring the Rohingyas

back ‘safely’ and the Rohingyas’ return can be termed as ‘voluntary
repatriation’, it is wise to pay attention to the way they are struggling
to cope in their new setting in the host society, how they are dealing
with different forms of exploitation in the land they have migrated to,
what they think of their future, and what the long-term and short-term
consequences of the current refugee situation are in Bangladesh.

Exploitation and Support by Locals

‘When people are on the knife of life and death, they become ready to
do anything to save their lives,’ said Kalam, a 48-year-old Rohingya who
came to Bangladesh in the beginning of September 2017, while explaining
the way he crossed the border, the Naf River, the no man’s land between
Bangladesh and Myanmar, and entered into Bangladesh. He continued:
A Bangladeshi boatman demanded a fare 20 times higher than the regular
crossing fee to bring me and my family from Myanmar to the Bangladesh
side of Naf River. I paid [him] since I was running to save my life and
my family. When we arrived in Teknaf, we did not get any shelter in any
camp, and therefore, I took shelter with my family members in the yard of
a local Bengali house. The household head had already built a small tent
using a plastic sheet and bamboo pillars and offered to let us stay there.
He demanded 3,000 BDT for the tent and 1,000 BDT as a monthly rent. I
took shelter with my family there temporarily. This is how the local people
are using our vulnerable conditions to make money. Now I am living in
Balukhali camp, but I have spent everything I brought from Rakhine and
don’t have a penny in my hand.

Kalam’s experience is not a solitary one since hundreds of local

Bengalis are exploiting the vulnerable conditions of the Rohingyas and
making money. This is the way vulnerability is reproduced in the form
of everyday discrimination and many newly arrived Rohingyas have
been going through this ever since they crossed the border.
This is, in fact, one side of the coin, while the other side shows a
different picture. I observed many local families supporting the newly
arrived Rohingyas in many ways including giving them shelter at their
homes, providing them food and clothes, and sometimes helping them
get registered in order to secure a place in temporary refugee camps.14
 Conclusion 199

Kafil Uddin, a 58-year-old local Bengali living in Shamlapur in Teknaf,

sheltered 32 Rohingyas from 9 families in his yard until they got reg-
istered and found a place in the temporary refugee camps. Kafil Uddin
sheltered them and provided them with food, clothes, and many other
daily essentials for five weeks. When I visited Kafil Uddin’s yard in
October 2017, I saw many Rohingyas there who were living sporadically
in different small tents made of plastic sheets. While talking to them,
I came to know that Kafil Uddin gave them food, three meals a day
cooked by his wife, for the first few days. By that time, the Rohingyas
had started receiving food and money provided unofficially at the
personal level through different charity organizations, local people,
and other Bangladeshis from across the country. Ramiz Mian, one of
the Rohingyas living in Kafil Uddin’s yard, who is 49 years old, told me
that ‘If Kafil bhai (Brother Kafil) had not given us shelter and provided
[us] necessary food in the first few days, we could not have survived. He
appeared to us [as] a niamot (blessing) of Allah. He is also trying to get
us registered in the Shaplapur refugee camps. We shall be ever grateful
to him and his family.’
The second picture is gradually becoming blurred, though it has not
disappeared yet, because the tension between the local communities
and the Rohingya refugees is growing and taking a confrontational
tone. Meanwhile, a couple of ethnic conflicts between the locals and
the Rohingyas and infighting15 among the Rohingyas took place and
resulted in a couple of deaths that were covered by national and inter-
national media.16 This is symptomatic, and hence, if tension mounts,
it could take any shape to put the Rohingyas in a further vulnerable
position. Therefore, how the Rohingyas are exploited by the locals and
how they react to it is important for shaping the structure of relations
between the Rohingyas and the host society.

Short-Term and Long-Term Challenges

Rohingya refugee situations have both short-term and long-term
consequences. Short-term challenges, which Bangladesh has already
started facing, are multifold: (1) feeding more than 1,300,000 people
with tonnes of food on a regular basis (daily, weekly, and monthly);
(2) providing basic healthcare services (particularly to pregnant
200 The Rohingya

women, newborn babies, and aged people); (3) providing sanitation

to more than one million additional people; (4) supplying drinkable
water to prevent waterborne diseases; (5) arrangement of cooking
materials instead of firewood to save forests and ecological settings; (6)
providing education to children; and (7) running and maintenance of
giant temporary refugee settlements. On the other hand, Bangladesh
will have to face some long-term challenges as well, which include:
(1) implementing voluntary repatriation with the involvement of UN
bodies; (2) maintaining law and order situations because it will be dif-
ficult for Bangladesh to maintain more than one million refugees in
order; (3) controlling women and child trafficking because trafficking
channels of women and children are very active in this region as part
of the South Asian trafficking network; (4) handling the transforming
relations with the local people since gradually tensions between the
host society and the Rohingyas are escalating and becoming worse day
by day; (5) checking the potential involvement in militant activities
because South Asia is popularly known as the hub of militant activism
and it could easily include the Rohingyas by exploiting their vulner-
able living conditions; and (6) the resettlement and relocation if their
duration of stay in Bangladesh extends.17 In fact, the big challenge for
the global community is to protect the Rohingyas from any forsee-
able humanitarian crisis. Also, hosting 1.3 million refugees in its land
should not be Bangladesh’s burden alone, and therefore ‘burden shar-
ing’ by the global community should be given due importance. Given
the situation, standing beside Rohingya refugees and supporting them
by ensuring that they have a minimum standard of human life could be
the best possible way in which the global community could compen-
sate for their collective failure to stop ‘genocide’ in Myanmar.

The State Is at the Centre

My long years of engagement with the Rohingya issue and my recent
experiences show that the main catalyst behind the Rohingya crisis is
the state of Myanmar. While the twenty-first century is called the century
of cultural pluralism, celebrated for its accommodation of differences,
Myanmar is unparalleled in the exclusion of cultural others and non-
accommodative of differences in its national space. Following the
 Conclusion 201

democratization process that started in 2011, it was expected that the

Rohingyas would regain their position in Myanmar with legal recogni-
tion and human dignity,18 but the opposite happened. One of the rea-
sons for this is that Myanmar is still under strong military dictatorship
in the name of democracy, and hence, Suu Kyi has little power to alter
the policy decisions of Myanmar state. Besides, Suu Kyi is a populist
politician19 who has regained her political power based on the populist
Buddhist sentiment. Therefore, Suu Kyi does not take any stand against
ethnic extremists and Buddhist fundamentalists who are committing
ethnic cleansing and genocide in Rakhine State. In fact, Myanmar’s
internal political dynamics is shaping into a venomous condition for
the Rohingyas and the state is the key player and main architect of this.
Military administration, political establishment, and ethno-religious
fundamentalism20 constitute a combined force to create an atrocious
condition in Rakhine State, which compels the Rohingyas to flee to
Bangladesh. It is important to note that the state is an abstract entity,
but it takes either a humanitarian shape or an atrocious one depending
upon the rulers of the state, that is, the government. State policy shapes
the nature of the state and Myanmar’s state policy is to eliminate the
Rohingyas from its land, this has made the Rohingyas life a subhuman
one. Local states as agents of the central state perpetrate and execute
its policy to eliminate the Rohingyas from the demography of Rakhine
State. Keeping this policy in mind, Myanmar has created a situation
good enough to render the Rohingyas subhumans. Therefore, there is
no scope to consider the crisis of the Rohingyas in Myanmar as an eth-
nic conflict between the Rakhine and the Rohingya communities or as a
religious riots between Rakhine Buddhists and the Rohingya Muslims.
It is a state-sponsored, deliberate, and systematic campaign against the
Rohingyas.

The Rohingyas and the ‘Subhuman’ Life

This book offers a theoretical proposition to understand the plight of
the people living in extremely vulnerable situations according to the
following points: (1) atrocious living conditions (which means unliv-
eable conditions for the people concerned); (2) illegal object in legal
framework (which denotes a particular group of people who do not
202 The Rohingya

exist in the legal structure of the modern nation state); (3) homeless
at home as they have nowhere to go (which reveals the critical condi-
tion of the people in the crisis of existence, as no state offers them a
piece of land for living); (4) can be killed, raped, and burnt without
impunity (which unfolds the extreme vulnerable conditions of a
group who could be killed, raped, and burnt without any legal action
against the perpetrators); and (5) a life deemed worthy of extinction
(which denotes a social position in which the society considers your
life worthy of extinction). Considering the situations prevailing in
both Bangladesh and Myanmar that have been presented in different
chapters of this book with first-hand vivid narratives, I do think that
the Rohingyas are dealt with as if they are lesser than human beings,
which I call subhuman life. First, the living conditions in Rakhine State
are, for all intents and purposes, unliveable for the Rohingyas because
the degree of brutalities committed there, which many term as ‘ethnic
cleanings’ and ‘genocide’, has created atrocious living conditions that
could easily render a human life into a ‘subhuman’ life. Second, as
stateless people and non-citizens, the Rohingyas belong to neither
Bangladesh nor Myanmar as they are non-existent entities in the legal
structure of both the states. Since citizenship is the gateway to all sorts
of rights,21 they do not have any social, political, economic, and civil
rights. In that sense, the Rohingyas are legally ‘non-life’. As such, their
life could be considered as lesser than that of human beings. Third,
Burmese people call them ‘Bengalese’ and Bengalis call them ‘bor-
maya’ or the people from Burma. The Rohingyas are non-citizens in
Myanmar and Bangladesh does not recognize them even as refugees.
Therefore, they have no space to flee persecution, atrocities, brutali-
ties, and random killing. They have no one to lodge complaints with
and no forum to seek justice from. The global cry for ensuring justice
for the Rohingyas is basically from their own sense of global commit-
ment to ensure peace and justice for global humanity. The Rohingyas
have nowhere to go and no one to turn to, which could make peoples’
lives extremely vulnerable. Fourth, a lot of personal narratives pre-
sented in different chapters of this book reveal the ground reality that
Myanmar’s security forces, some ethnic extremists, and some Rakhine
Buddhists have been given free license to kill, rape, and burn the
Rohingyas at any point at any time. And this is what the Rohingyas
have gone through following the military crackdown that started on
 Conclusion 203

25 August 2017. Fifth, the way the Rohingyas were treated in Rakhine
State following the recent military crackdown, as if their lives are wor-
thy of extinction, is reflected in the various personal narratives and
collective memories of the newly arrived Rohingyas in Bangladesh. To
some extent, a Rohingya life is even lesser than a beast’s life because a
beast’s life sometimes receives some sort of mercy, kindness, and care,
but when I say ‘the life lesser than that of a human being’, it involves
merciless atrocities, unkind brutalities, and uncaring cruelties as if that
life is worthy of extinction. Considering all aspects of Rohingya lives,
all sorts of personal narratives, all forms of collective memories, and
all kinds of circumstantial evidence, it is evident that the Rohingyas
are dealt with are as if they are lesser than human beings and lead
what I prefer to call subhuman life.

Future of the Rohingyas

Though the Rohingyas at Pasan Para and Vasan Para, majority of whom
came in 1978 and 1991/1992, do not even think about going back to
Rakhine State, the newly arrived Rohingyas are part of Bangladesh’s repa-
triation initiative. The recent move between Bangladesh and Myanmar
gives the impression that Myanmar is reluctant about the process and
is not inclined to bring them back. However, most of the newly arrived
Rohingyas do not even have a clear idea about their future, let alone
the repatriation process. Some want to go back to Rakhine State if the
situation becomes better. Many of them said that they would go back to
their ‘homeland’ if they are recognized as the citizens of Myanmar, their
life safety is guaranteed, and they are dealt with like normal human
beings. Many of the Rohingyas I met do not believe that Myanmar
will ever take them back. Fazal, a 46-year-old Rohingya who arrived in
Bangladesh in October 2017, told me:
They did not push us here just to take us back again. When I, along
with others who were a part of other groups, was severely beaten by
many local Buddhist extremists and military soldiers, they repeatedly
said that we are from Bangladesh, we are not Myanmar’s residents, we
are illegal Bengali migrants, we have to go back to Bangladesh, and we
have no place in Borma. Either we have to flee to Bangladesh or we
have to die. The choice is ours. We chose to flee to Bangladesh. This is
not because we feel that we are Bengalis; we did this to save our lives.
204 The Rohingya

Fazal’s statement indicates that majority of the Rohingyas believe

that Myanmar will not take them back or return their homes, lands,
and properties. Therefore, their future lies in three potential alterna-
tives: (1) going back to Myanmar following the success of repatriation;
(2) scopes of social integration in the host societies; and (3) leading a
refugee life in the camps.22 Many of the Rohingyas do not even think
about the future since they are currently caught up in the everyday
struggles of ensuring that their present is ‘good’ and ‘comfortable’.
Though I am not comfortable making policy suggestions to resolve
the problem, due to my long engagement and deep involvement with
research on the Rohingyas, I would like to make some concluding
remarks. Amid interaction with hundreds of Rohingyas and in the pro-
cess of understanding their pains and pleasures, joys and sorrows, past
and present, and their uncertainty and vulnerability, I have found an
idea for a solution to the problem. I can summarize their feelings in
three conditions: legal recognition, social safety, and human dignity.
In fact, the majority of the Rohingyas would like to go back to their
‘homeland’ with the assurance that they will be given citizenship (legal
recognition); their life will be protected from any sort of uncertainty of
killing, raping, burning, and torturing (social safety); and they will be
treated with dignity (human dignity).

Notes
1. See Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Culture (New York: Basic Books,
1973).
2. See Nasir Uddin, ‘Decolonising Ethnography in the Field: An
Anthropological Account,’ International Journal of Social Research Methodology 14,
no. 6 (2011): 455–67.
3. Karl Marx’s famous thesis, ‘The philosophers have only interpreted the
world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it’, formulated a cen-
tury ago, is still relevant in social sciences. For details, see Bhaskar Sunkara,
‘Why the Ideas of Karl Marx Are More Relevant than Ever in the 21st Century,’
Guardian, 25 January 2013, accessed 20 March 2018, https://www.theguardian.
com/commentisfree/2013/jan/25/karl-marx-relevant-21st-century.
4. Signe Howell, The Ethnography of Moralities (London and New York:
Routledge, 1997); also for details, see Mark Goodale, ‘Between Facts and Norms:
Towards an Anthropology of Ethical Practice,’ in The Anthropology of Moralities,
ed. Monica Heintz (Oxford and New York: Berghahn, 2013), 183–99; Didier
 Conclusion 205

Fassin, ‘Beyond Good and Evil?: Questioning the Anthropological Discomfort

with Morals,’ Anthropological Theory 8, no. 4 (2008): 333–44.
5. See Michael Flood, Brian Martin, and Tanja Dreher, ‘Combining Academia
and Activism: Common Obstacles and Useful Tools,’ Austrian Universities Review
55, no. 1 (2013): 17–26.
6. When I write ‘Rohingya refugee situation’, I mean how the problem of the
massive refugee influx that Bangladesh is now shouldering could be resolved.
The critical conditions that the Rohingyas have been experiencing in Arakan/
Rakhine State of Burma/Myanmar should be taken into account in the broader
spectrum of the problem.
7. When I use the term ‘global community’, I mean the international actors
including those who are instrumental in dealing with the refugee situation,
human rights issues, and the issue of democratization. Though the roles of
international actors in conflict resolution are not out of question, here I use the
term ‘global community’ in a more general sense of the term.
8. Economist, ‘The Rohingya Refugee Crisis Is the Worst in Decades,’
21 September 2017, accessed 21 March 2018, https://www.economist.com/
blogs/graphicdetail/2017/09/daily-chart-13.
9. Sarah Wildman, ‘The World’s Fastest-Growing Refugee Crisis Is
Taking Place in Myanmar. Here’s Why,’ VOX NEWS, 18 September 2017,
accessed 20 March 2018, https://www.vox.com/world/2017/9/18/16312054/
rohingya-muslims-myanmar-refugees-violence.
10. Daily Star, ‘Donors [Are] Losing Interests in Rohingyas: WFP,’ 14 February
2018, accessed 22 March 2018, https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/
donors-lose-interest-rohingyas-wfp-1534360.
11. Nasir Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle
for Existence (in Bengali) (Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b).
12. Nasir Uddin, ‘The State, Vulnerability, and Transborder Movement:
The Rohingyas in Myanmar and Bangladesh,’ in Deterritorialised Identity and
Transborder Movements in South Asia, eds. Nasir Uddin and Nasreen Chowdhory
(Singapore: Springer, 2019c), 73–90.
13. See Nasir Uddin, ‘Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Five Challenges for
the Future,’ LSE South Asia (Blog), 21 November 2018b, accessed 31 March 2019,
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/southasia/2018/11/21/rohingya-refugees-in-bangladesh-
five-challenges-for-the-future/.
14. Many cases of local support have been stated and narrated in this
book.
15. Tarek Mahmud, ‘Infighting Causes Unrest at Rohingya Camps,’
The Dhaka Tribune, 4 March 2018, accessed 10 April 2018, http://www.
dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/nation/2018/03/04/personal-conflicts-cause-
unrest-rohingya-camps/.
206 The Rohingya

16. See Tarek Mahmud, ‘Suspected Gang Member Killed in Rohingya Turf
War,’ The Dhaka Tribune, 8 March 2018, accessed 10 April 2018, http://www.dhaka-
tribune.com/bangladesh/nation/2018/03/08/rohingya-man-shot-coxs-bazar/.
17. Uddin, ‘Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh’.
18. Uddin, Not Rohingyas, but Royainga.
19. See Ronan Lee, ‘A Politician, Not an Icon: Aung San Suu Kyi's Silence
on Myanmar's Muslim Rohingya,’ Islam and Christian–Muslim Relations 25, no. 3
(2014): 321–33.
20. Azeem Ibrahim also discussed the commonality of interest among the
political elites and military establishment as the reason behind the emergence
of a force against the Rohingya Muslims. See Azeem Ibrahim, The Rohingyas:
Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide (London: Hurst & Company, 2016).
21. See Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt
Books, 1994).
22. Also see Nasir Uddin, ‘The Solutions to the Rohingya Crisis: Voices from
the Field,’ South Asia Journal, 17 November 2018c, accessed 31 March 2019,
http://southasiajournal.net/the-solutions-to-the-rohingya-crisis-voices-from-
the-field/.
Appendices

Appendix 1
Rohingya Organizations

ARIF Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front

ARNO Arakan Rohingya National Organisation
ARSA Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army
BROUK Burmese Rohingya Organization UK (BROUK)
IMA Ittihad-ul Mujahideen of Arakan
RLO Rohingya Liberation Organization
RPF Rohingya Patriotic Front
RSO Rohingya Solidarity Organisation
208 Appendices

Appendix 2
The names of the villages located on both sides of the major rivers in
Arakan:
On both sides of the Lemru River: Sara, Bandar, Kualong,
Rajarbil, Baldipara, Pangdu, Kambao, Shishruk, Melatudyng, Batang,
Shendong, Piparang, Daspara, Meyonbu, Butlu, Halingbong,
Halimapar, Chenbbli, Puran Para, Chittapara, Kottipara, Paikpara,
Kaim, Barbassa, and so on.
On both sides of the Mingan River: Nisa, Padong, Julapara,
Mainakachcha, Manjundak, Sakhariperang, Rajapara, Babudong, and
so on.
On both banks of the Kaladan River: Chandana, Miurkul,
Kainiperang, Bakaim, Shuling perang, Tangfak, Bhave, Afskau, Keri,
Qazipara, Keyeda, Rohingya Para, Ramju Para, Ambari, Keyakta
Khenda, Baharpara, Sinohpara, Lakhnanpara, Kulwari, Tangtangnirang,
Pallarpara, Meyoktang, Shwepyai, Bawdali-ywa, and so on.
On the both sides of the Mayu River: Villages and settlements are
Rathedaung, Mujardia (Mozi Island), Auknanra, Aternanara, Kawakson,
Machchari, Angperayang, Rajarbil, Raushenpereng, Jopepereng,
Samila, Puimali, Rowainga-daung, Alikhang, Moi-daung, Suofang,
Maruchang, Khnachang, Gaulengi, Badga, Gopphe, Tamee, Lawadang,
Taimongkhali, Buthidaung, and so on.
On south and eastern side of the River Naf: Maungdaw, Amtala,
Battala, Walideng, Laingthe, Kazirbil, Bolibazar, Nagpura, Bara
Sikdarpara, Kaaripara, Habshipara, Arabshah Para, Shuja Para,
Rajarbil, Nurullahpara and Ali Thangaw, Udaung, Myinlwet, Shilkhali,
Andaung.

Source: Abdul Karim, The Rohingyas: A Short Account of Their History and
Culture (Dhaka: Jatya Shahitya Prakash, [1997] 2016), 96.
 Appendices 209

Appendix 3
The Mujahid Party sent a letter written in Urdu, dated 9 June 1948, to the
government of the Union of Burma through the sub-divisional officer
of Maungdaw township. Their demands were as follows (Department
of Defence Service Archives, Rangoon: CD 1016/10/11):

1. The area between the west bank of Kaladan River and the east bank of
Naf River must be recognized as the national home of the Muslims
in Burma.
2. The Muslims in Arakan must be accepted as the nationals of Burma.
3. The Mujahid Party must be granted a legal status as a political
organization.
4. The Urdu language must be acknowledged as the national language
of the Muslims in Arakan and be taught in the schools in the Muslim
areas.
5. The refugees from the Kyauktaw and Myohaung (MraukU) town-
ships must be resettled in their villages at the expense of the state.
6. The Muslims under detention by the Emergency Security Act must
be unconditionally released.
7. A general amnesty must be granted for the members of the Mujahid
Party.
Source: Aye Chan, ‘ The Development of a Muslim Enclave in Arakan
(Rakhine) State of Burma (Myanmar),’ SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research 3, no. 2
(2005): 411.
210 Appendices

Appendix 4

Figure A4.1 Card given to the Rohingyas living in Bangladesh after their
registration in the biometric database
Note: Photograph and ID have been intentionally erased.
Source: Author.
 Appendices 211

Appendix 5

Figure A5.1 Major ethnic groups in Myanmar

Note: This map does not represent the authentic international boundaries. It is not to
scale and is provided for illustrative purposes only.
Source: Shakeeb Asrar, ‘Rohingya Crisis Explained in Maps,’ Al Jazeera, 28 October
2017, accessed 16 May 2019, https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2017/
09/rohingya-crisis-explained-maps-170910140906580.html.
212 Appendices

Appendix 6

Figure A6.1 Following Myanmar’s fleeing Rohingyas

Notes: This map does not represent the authentic international boundaries. It is not
to scale and is provided for illustrative purposes only.
Source: Shakeeb Asrar, ‘Rohingya Crisis Explained in Maps,’ Al Jazeera, 28 October 2017,
accessed 16 May 2019, https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/2017/09/
rohingya-crisis-explained-maps-170910140906580.html.
 Appendices 213

Appendix 7
Table A7.1 Population Census, 2010

Arakan State Population by Township

Sittwe 282,509
Ponnagyun 129,845
Mrauk-U 208,435
Kyauktaw 224,421
Minbya 198,831
Myebon 120,101
Pauktaw 176,231
Rathedaung 169,713
Maungdaw 506,986
Buthidaung 292,486
Kyaudpyu 19,668
Munaung 72,171
Ramree 149,184
Ann 110,707
Thandwe 125,486
Toungup 147,076
Gwa 80,148
Total 3,013,998
Source: ‘Populations 2010,’ The Stateless Rohingya, accessed 20 October 2017,
http://www.thestateless.com/populations-2010.
214 Appendices

Appendix 8
Table A8.1 The main language (families) of the Bamar majority
and the Rohingya, Kachin, and Wa minorities

Different Ethnic Groups, Their Languages, Language Family,

and Population
People Main Language Family Native Speakers
Language (Million)
Bamar Burmese Tibeto-Burman 33.0
Rohingya Rohingya Indo-Aryan/European 1.80
Kachin Jingpho Tibeto-Burman 0.94
Wa Wa Austro-Asiatic 0.90
Source: Cited in Mahalia Gaskin Mcdaniel, John Leake, and Thomas Wanner,
The Politics of Identity in Myanmar: The Rohingya, Kachin and Wa Ethnic Minorities
(Institute of International Development and the University of Adelaide, 2017), 13.
Appendix 9
Table A9.1 Age and gender breakdown by camp/site
Camp Infant Infant 1–4 1–4 5–11 5–11 12–17 12–17 18–59 18–59 60+ 60+ Total Total
female male Children Children Children Children Children Children Adult Adult Elderly Elderly Families Individuals
below 1 below 1 Female Male Female Male Female Male Female Male Female Male
Camp 15 946 901 3,540 3,697 5,304 5,486 3,435 3,606 11,540 9,196 910 907 11,184 49,468
Camp 13 722 773 3,112 3,220 4,528 4,797 2,779 2,858 9,826 7,771 744 688 9,800 41,818
Camp 26 697 615 3,133 3,132 4,741 5,206 2,973 2,765 9,803 6,760 634 555 9,393 41,014
Camp 1W 763 758 2,956 2,974 4,438 4,535 2,687 2,790 9,694 7,787 866 753 9,470 41,001
Camp 1E 669 745 2,842 3,033 4,335 4,554 2,697 2,803 9,480 7,859 816 712 9,329 40,545
Camp 3 692 743 3,026 3,134 4,242 4,450 2,529 2,728 9,424 7,368 693 595 9,197 39,624
Camp 7 709 713 3,051 3,166 4,280 4,483 2,683 2,654 9,248 7,211 724 655 9,411 39,577
Camp 9 669 601 2,775 2,927 3,989 4,115 2,489 2,462 8,686 7,018 740 655 8,682 37,126
Camp 24 508 520 2,280 2,490 4,028 4,146 2,308 2,405 8,000 5,897 544 413 7,760 33,539
Camp 10 617 598 2,629 2,663 3,398 3,699 2,126 2,057 7,730 6,115 580 561 7,652 32,773
Camp 8W 525 532 2,602 2,491 3,492 3,658 2,150 2,216 7,617 6,092 602 527 7,465 32,504
Camp 4 583 638 2,470 2,605 3,601 3,739 2,067 2,063 7,672 6,006 519 403 7,948 32,366
Camp 14 560 587 2,311 2,559 3,395 3,742 2,260 2,244 7,297 5,826 605 525 7,049 31,911
Camp 11 548 579 2,364 2,389 3,379 3,583 2,136 2,192 7,254 5,930 532 495 7,127 31,381
Camp 8E 529 498 2,291 2,353 3,340 3,399 2,192 2,161 7,362 5,837 560 540 7,208 31,062
Camp 2E 559 532 2,325 2,363 3,333 3,597 1,823 1,866 7,286 5,467 519 448 7,292 30,118
Nayapara RC* 84 90 1,555 1,641 2,942 3,013 2,295 2,362 7,195 5,159 457 425 5,709 27,218
Camp 18 460 500 2,213 2,234 2,848 2,985 1,780 1,670 6,387 4,980 359 365 6,540 26,781
Camp 2W 431 433 1,930 2,028 2,921 3,163 1,628 1,614 6,128 4,807 497 396 5,965 25,976
Camp 5 433 468 1,953 2,030 2,792 2,828 1,538 1,618 5,956 4,633 465 416 6,047 25,130

(Cont’d)
Table A9.1 (Cont’d)
Camp Infant Infant 1–4 1–4 5–11 5–11 12–17 12–17 18–59 18–59 60+ 60+ Total Total
female male Children Children Children Children Children Children Adult Adult Elderly Elderly Families Individuals
below 1 below 1 Female Male Female Male Female Male Female Male Female Male
Camp 6 527 463 2,011 2,147 2,719 2,922 1,468 1,555 5,798 4,592 439 390 5,826 25,031
Camp 12 404 387 1,757 1,870 2,543 2,810 1,704 1,630 5,510 4,281 440 378 5,276 23,714
Camp 22 410 380 1,592 1,799 2,558 2,615 1,675 1,668 4,842 3,963 378 336 4,587 22,216
Camp 16 432 405 1,605 1,701 2,353 2,570 1,522 1,436 5,022 4,030 385 327 4,880 21,788
Camp 19 335 325 1,593 1,676 2,244 2,495 1,423 1,464 4,843 3,769 350 286 4,826 20,803
Kutupalong RC* 80 60 1,012 1,149 1,903 2,037 1,475 1,435 4,552 3,540 255 239 3,548 17,737
Camp 17 265 304 1,418 1,443 1,887 1,972 1,029 1,043 4,029 3,089 228 245 4,020 16,952
Camp 27 238 217 1,092 1,147 1,674 1,710 1,028 1,062 3,307 2,383 219 185 3,150 14,262
Camp 21 224 215 908 958 1,347 1,412 760 797 2,970 2,367 182 137 3,017 12,277
Camp 23 181 199 808 845 1,451 1,491 632 650 2,687 1,690 170 159 2,661 10,963
Camp 25 140 158 710 701 1,105 1,189 742 685 2,209 1,578 168 112 2,143 9,497
Camp 20 131 129 596 640 829 868 413 468 1,803 1,350 121 98 1,794 7,446
Camp 4 105 111 481 522 676 697 350 348 1,475 1,169 92 86 1,495 6,112
Extension
Camp 20 83 80 374 416 498 534 273 265 1,108 888 58 53 1,119 4,630
Extension
No camp** 108 90 459 464 634 626 309 333 1,290 1,040 86 62 1,299 5,501
Total 15,367 15,347 67,774 70,607 99,747 105,126 61,378 61,973 215,030 167,448 15,937 14,127 209,869 909,861

Notes:*Kutupalong refugee camp includes 14,277 registered refugees of 2,617 families and Nayapara refugee camp includes 19,895 registered
refugees of 3,704 families.
**This represents refugees residing outside formal camp boundaries.
Source: UNHCR.
Appendix 10
Table A10.1 Population figures by period of arrival
Arrival Period Before 09 Oct 2016 09 Oct 2016–24 Aug 25 Aug 2017–31 Dec 01 Jan 2018–31 Dec 01 Feb 2019–Current
2017 2017 2018 Date
Camp Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total
Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals
Camp 15 12 50 765 3,390 10,392 45,967 13 51 2 10 11,184 49,468
Camp 13 15 60 784 3,434 8,918 37,977 76 308 7 39 9,800 41,818
Camp 26 85 412 827 3,675 8,045 35,038 436 1,889 – – 9,393 41,014
Camp 1W 28 107 1,043 4,501 8,369 36,295 29 95 1 3 9,470 41,001
Camp 1E 52 236 1,646 7,095 7,592 33,071 34 122 5 21 9,329 40,545
Camp 3 21 99 943 4,164 8,194 35,199 31 130 8 32 9,197 39,624
Camp 7 108 468 1,109 4,791 8,093 33,939 93 350 8 29 9,411 39,577
Camp 9 77 317 1,680 6,873 6,883 29,791 36 123 6 22 8,682 37,126
Camp 24 2,158 10,459 523 2,210 5,063 20,818 16 52 – – 7,760 33,539
Camp 10 24 96 804 3,342 6,802 29,250 21 81 1 4 7,652 32,773
Camp 8W 35 152 728 3,236 6,625 28,815 76 296 1 5 7,465 32,504
Camp 4 31 126 343 1,409 7,293 29,664 275 1,143 6 24 7,948 32,366
Camp 14 14 55 601 2,786 6,392 28,905 42 165 – – 7,049 31,911
Camp 11 4 15 1,081 4,797 6,021 26,490 19 73 2 6 7,127 31,381
Camp 8E 43 171 871 3,745 6,264 27,029 29 113 1 4 7,208 31,062
Camp 2E 3,318 14,056 1,687 7,064 2,208 8,737 73 239 6 22 7,292 30,118
Nayapara RC* 3,757 20,374 248 972 1,668 5,766 36 106 – – 5,709 27,218
Camp 18 16 59 195 809 6,279 25,715 37 135 13 63 6,540 26,781
Camp 2W 1,881 8,615 1,407 6,076 2,596 11,003 69 232 12 50 5,965 25,976
Camp 5 31 129 558 2,349 5,436 22,569 21 78 1 5 6,047 25,130

(Cont’d)
Table A10.1 (Cont’d)
Arrival Period Before 09 Oct 2016 09 Oct 2016–24 Aug 25 Aug 2017–31 Dec 01 Jan 2018–31 Dec 01 Feb 2019–Current
2017 2017 2018 Date
Camp Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total Total
Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals Families Individuals
Camp 6 58 258 1,126 5,074 4,618 19,615 23 82 1 2 5,826 25,031
Camp 12 9 49 264 1,199 4,937 22,204 59 231 7 31 5,276 23,714
Camp 22 10 54 207 998 4,355 21,103 15 61 – – 4,587 22,216
Camp 16 9 46 282 1,248 4,570 20,410 19 84 – – 4,880 21,788
Camp 19 5 15 400 1,801 4,217 18,160 201 817 3 10 4,826 20,803
Kutupalong RC* 2,833 14,907 155 609 541 2,159 18 59 1 3 3,548 17,737
Camp 17 35 153 216 880 2,632 10,949 1,136 4,967 1 3 4,020 16,952
Camp 27 29 142 275 1,300 2,698 12,142 148 678 – – 3,150 14,262
Camp 21 13 57 143 617 2,729 11,125 129 470 3 8 3,017 12,277
Camp 23 252 1,155 287 1,222 2,106 8,517 16 69 – – 2,661 10,963
Camp 25 17 85 252 1,122 1,870 8,271 4 19 – – 2,143 9,497
Camp 20 58 260 117 490 1,294 5,384 325 1,312 – – 1,794 7,446
Camp 4 Extension 60 236 135 597 1,170 4,732 130 547 – – 1,495 6,112
Camp 20 Extension 78 328 88 393 725 3,016 224 871 4 22 1,119 4,630
No camp** 102 421 87 357 823 3,538 177 717 110 468 1,299 5,501
Grand Total 15,278 74,222 21,877 94,625 168,418 723,363 4,086 16,765 210 886 209,869 909,861

Notes:*Kutupalong refugee camp includes 14,277 registered refugees of 2,617 families and Nayapara refugee camp includes 19,895 registered
refugees of 3,704 families.
**This represents refugees residing outside formal camp boundaries.
Source: UNHCR.
Appendix 11
Table A11.1 Population figures by specific needs
Camp Families with Families With Families Families with Families with Families with Single Male Single Families
Separated Unaccompanied with a Older Person Older Person People with Serious Parents Female with People
Children Children Person With at Risk at Risk with Medical Condition with Parent with Specific
Disability Children Infants Needs
Camp 26 171 53 279 356 114 216 81 2,174 3,226
Camp 15 234 60 354 589 199 460 63 1,607 3,215
Camp 1E 174 46 553 464 326 490 56 1,165 2,947
Camp 7 225 30 379 384 258 476 103 1,305 2,891
Nayapara RC 175 43 577 155 49 1,180 36 1,166 2,778
Camp 13 244 78 312 394 207 346 63 1,423 2,805
Camp 1W 165 32 402 449 215 443 66 1,270 2,778
Camp 3 203 63 373 369 288 321 65 1,427 2,684
Camp 24 176 73 301 284 121 256 43 1,642 2,639
Camp 4 242 88 199 296 207 295 101 1,508 2,586
Camp 9 119 66 398 402 262 499 107 1,049 2,544
Camp 10 131 72 392 349 223 512 96 990 2,416
Camp 8E 165 76 327 354 228 390 91 1,064 2,282
Camp 2E 161 54 261 250 202 305 54 1,221 2,275
Camp 18 152 67 245 229 169 291 81 1,130 2,082
Camp 11 168 60 264 289 157 233 67 1,058 1,977
Camp 5 154 63 219 298 160 221 60 1,099 1,973

(Cont’d)
Table A11.1 (Cont’d)
Camp Families with Families With Families Families with Families with Families with Single Male Single Families
Separated Unaccompanied with a Older Person Older Person People with Serious Parents Female with People
Children Children Person With at Risk at Risk with Medical Condition with Parent with Specific
Disability Children Infants Needs
Camp 14 119 45 185 314 138 305 43 966 1,909
Camp 6 165 44 210 242 130 314 43 836 1,845
Camp 2W 108 18 288 241 115 271 59 810 1,764
Camp 8W 107 37 213 248 165 281 56 781 1,699
Kutupalong RC 52 15 372 96 36 787 6 548 1,555
Camp 12 81 33 144 203 102 138 33 767 1,461
Camp 19 124 33 190 220 82 117 48 765 1,427
Camp 16 92 22 167 201 81 159 35 704 1,339
Camp 17 106 21 142 150 80 123 43 697 1,242
Camp 22 70 18 159 156 77 154 16 580 1,123
Camp 27 55 13 99 89 35 63 21 729 1,026
Camp 23 50 12 72 97 43 69 11 752 1,020
Camp 21 67 24 110 96 32 105 35 513 902
Camp 25 38 23 75 83 33 87 18 493 754
Camp 20 32 15 72 59 43 73 17 289 546
Camp 4 Extension 22 14 58 46 39 47 16 194 413
Camp 20 Extension 22 12 41 32 22 27 10 119 289
No camp 19 6 29 40 12 22 7 142 331
Total 4,388 1,429 8,461 8,524 4,650 10,076 1,750 32,983 64,743

Source: UNHCR.
 Appendices 221

Appendix 12
Table A12.1 Resettlement of Myanmar refugees from Bangladesh, 2006–10

Year Destination Submissions Departures

2006 Canada 28 13
Total 28 13
2007 Canada 204 75
New Zealand 54
United Kingdom 121
Total 379 75
2008 Australia 151
Canada 212 76
Ireland 112 23
New Zealand 11 4
Norway 12 19
Sweden 19
United Kingdom 34
United States 32
Total 549 156
2009 Australia 120 108
Canada 3 122
Ireland 82
New Zealand 12 27
United Kingdom 112 109
United States 302 17
Total 549 465
2010 Australia 108 134
Canada 17
New Zealand 6
United Kingdom 112 47
United States 272 7
Total 492 211
Grand Total 1,997 920
Source: Esther Kiragu, Angela Li Rosi, and Tim Morris, States of Denial: A Review of
UNHCR’s Response to the Protracted Situation of Stateless Rohingya Refugees in
Bangladesh (Bangladesh/Myanmar: UN High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR],
2011), accessed 3 November 2017, http://www.refworld.org/docid/5142eb7a2.html.
222 Appendices

Appendix 13
Table A13.1 Bilateral trade between Bangladesh and Myanmar
from financial year 2005–6 to 2012–13

Financial Year Imports from Myanmar Export to Myanmar

(in Millions U$$) (in Millions U$$)
2005–6 66.64 5.19
2006–7 60.00 6.31
2007–8 57.85 9.58
2008–9 66.60 9.17
2009–10 57.00 10.24
2010–11 166.9 9.00
2011–12 65.25 13.45
2012–13 84.00 13.67
Source: Ministry of Trade and Commerce and Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2013,
Bangladesh government, cited in Jashim Uddin, ‘Prospects for Attaining New
Height in Bangladesh–Myanmar Relations: Bangladesh Perspectives,’ Bangladesh
International Institute for Strategic Studies Journal 35, no. 1 (2014): 12.
 Appendices 223

Appendix 14
Table A14.1 Year-wise repatriation of Rohingya refugees

Year Number of refugees

1992 5,962
1993 46,129
1994 82,753
1995 61,504
1996 23,045
1997 10,073
1998 106
1999 1,128
2000 1,323
2001 283
2002 760
2003 3,231
2004 210
2005 92
Total 236,599

Source: UNHCR website and Kutupalong Information Center in Ukhia.

224 Appendices

Appendix 15
Table A15.1 Kings of Arakan who had two names
(Buddhist and Muslim)

Sl. Name of kings Reigning period Muslim names

1. Min Saw Mum or 1430–4 Sulaiman Shah or
Narameikhla Sawmum Shah
2. Naranu or Min Khari 1434–59 Ali Shah or Aki Khan
3. Basawpyu 1459–82 Kalima Shah
4. Min Dawlya 1482–92 Mu-Khu-Shah
5. Basawnyo 1492–4 Muhammad Shah
6. Yanaung 1494 Nuri Shah
7. Salingathu 1494–1501 Shiek Abddullah Shah
8. Minyaza 1501–13 Ilayas Shah-1
9. Kasabadi 1513–15 Ilayas Shah-11
10. Mim Saw O 1515 Jallal Shah
11. Thatasa 1515–21 Ali Shah
12. Min Khaung Raza 1521–31 El-Shah Azad
13. Min Bin 1531–53 Zabuk Shah
14. Min Dikha 1553–5 Daud Khan
15. Min Palaung 1571–93 Sikandar Shah
16. Minyazagyi 1593–1612 Salim Shah-1
17. Min Khamaung 1612–22 Husain Shah
18. Thiri Thudamma 1622–38 Salim Shah-11
Source: Mahfuzur Rahman Akhanda, The History of Muslims in Arakan (in Bengali)
(Dhaka-Chittagong: Bangladesh Co-operative Book Society, 2013), 255; Karim,
The Rohingyas, 30; M.S. Colls and Bu Shan Shwe, ‘Arakan’s Place in the Civilization
of the Bay: A Study of the Coinage and Foreign Relations,’ in The Rohingyas of
Arakan: History and Heritage, edited by Mohibullah Siddiquee, 62–6 (Chittagong:
Ali Publishing House, 2014).
Glossary

Balukhali The name of a refugee camp in Ukhia

bangsha Lineage
bari Home
beyai The relation between the bride’s father and the bride-
groom’s father in the Chittagonian region. It is quite
often known as a very genial relation
bhai Brother
Bormaya People from Burma or the people who have migrated
from Burma
Borma Burma/Myanmar
burqa Burqa is a particular kind of over-cloth that Muslim
women usually wear for maintaining purdah, a principle
of Islamic dress code
Cherang Household details form
ghor House
Gonda It means hatchery, which is used for fish production,
cultivation, rearing, and marketing
Gorom Heat
haak Rights
hafezi Master of the Quran who can recite it by heart from
the beginning to the end
ichha Desire
januar Animals
jaat/jatee Nation
226 Glossary

jibon Life
jummah Friday prayer
Kamanchi A category of Muslims living in Myanmar
kani A traditional scale of land measurement
khalifa King in Islamic Saltanat
kopal Fate
kular Foreigner
Kutupalong The name of a refugee camp in Ukhia
Leda The name of a makeshift camp for Rohingya refugees
Magrib A prayer that Muslims say at sunset
majhi The leader of a Rohingya refugee camp
manush Human being
maulavi The imam of a mosque
Mogh Name given to Rakhine Buddhists by the Rohingyas
moktob School for Islamic education, like a madrasa
mulisas Helpful person
mulluk State
niamot Blessing
nioti Destiny
o-manush Bad people who are unlike a human being
panta-vat Water-rice
parishad Council
Pasan Para Cruel village
purdah Veil
Samaj A kind of social organization that works as an agency
of social control and exercises an informal judicial
system in rural Bangladesh.
Taal The name of a makeshift camp for Rohingya refugees
upazila Sub-district
Vasan Para Floating village
vumi-putra Son of the soil
Bibliography

Addo, Michael K. The Legal Nature of International Human Rights. Leiden and
Boston: Martinus Nijhoff Publisher, 2010.
Agamben, Giorgio. Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life. Translated by
D. Heller-Roazen. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1998.
Agence France-Presse (AFP). Myanmar, [and] Bangladesh Leaders ’to Discuss
Rohingya’. Paris, 25 June 2012.
Ahmed, A. Taib. ‘Rohingyas Organise against Repatriation before Recognition’.
Prothom Alo, 28 February 2018. Accessed 2 October 2018. https://en.
prothomalo.com/bangladesh/news/171735/Rohingyas-organise-against-
repatriation-before.
Ahmed, Imtiaz, ed. The Plight of the Stateless Rohingyas: Responses of the State,
Society and International Community. Dhaka: The University Press Limited,
2010.
———. ‘State and Stateless in South Asia: Reaping Benefits from a Reconstructed
Discourse on State and Nationality.’ Theoretical Perspective 9 & 10, 2002–3.
Akhanda, Mahfuzur. History of Muslims in Arakan (in Bengali). Chittagong-
Dhaka: Bangladesh Co-operative Society, 2013.
Akhanda, Mahfuzur Rahman. The Rohingya Problem and Bangladesh (in Bengali).
Rajshahi: Porilekh, 2018.
Alam, Jobair. ‘The Rohingya of Myanmar: Theoretical Significance of the
Minority Status.’ Asian Ethnicity 19, no. 2 (2018): 180–210.
Alam, Mayesha. ‘How the Rohingya Crisis Is Affecting Bangladesh—and Why
it Matters.’ Washington Post, 12 February 2018. Accessed 16 August 2018.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/02/12/
how-the-rohingya-crisis-is-affecting-bangladesh-and-why-it matters/?noredirect=
on&utm_term=.4f85f11f7cb0.
228 Bibliography

———. ‘5 Things You Need to Know about the Rohingya Crisis—and How it
Could Roil Southeast Asia.’ Washington Post, 14 September 2017. Accessed
20 January 2018. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/
wp/2017/09/14/5-things-you-need-to-know-about-rohingya-crisis-and-
how-it-could-roil-southeast-asia/?utm_term=.cd5044ac1d04.
Alam, Mohammad A. A Short Historical Background of Arakan. Chittagong:
Arakan Historical Society, 1999. Accessed 2 February 2018. https://www.
kaladanpress.org/images/document/2018/A%20Short%20Historical%20
Background%20%20of%20Arakan.pdf.
Al-Faruque, Abdullah. ‘Plight of Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Legal Aspects
of the Problem.’ In To Host or To Hurt: Counter-Narratives on Rohingya Refugee
Issue in Bangladesh, edited by Nasir Uddin, 65–80. Dhaka: Institute of Culture
and Development Research (ICDR), 2012.
Al Jazeera. ‘The Hidden Genocide.’ 16 January 2013. Accessed 28 October 2018.
https://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeerainvestigates/2012/12/
2012125122215836351.html.
Almeida, Miguel. ‘Citizenship and Anthropology: Perplexities of a Hybrid Social
Agent.’ Paper presented at European Association of Social Anthropologists
(EASA) Conference, Copenhagen, 17 August 2002.
Amanullah. ‘The Etymology of Arakan.’ The Arakan 10, no. 2 (1997): 4–5.
Amnesty International. ‘Who Are the Rohingyas? What Is Happening in
Myanmar?’ 26 September 2017. Accessed 26 December 2017. https://www.
amnesty.org.au/who-are-the-rohingya-refugees/.
Arefeen, Helaluddin. Changing Agrarian Structure in Bangladesh: Shimulia, a
Study of a Periurban Village. Dhaka. Centre for Social Studies, 1986.
———. ‘Some Aspects of Lineage Organization among the Muslims of
Bangladesh.’ Man in India 92, no. 1 (2012): 1–12.
Arendt, Hannah. The Origins of Totalitarianism. New York: Harcourt Books,
1994.
Asad, T. ‘Where Are the Margins of the State?’ In Anthropology in the Margins of the
State, edited by V. Das and D. Poole, 279–88. New Delhi: Oxford University
Press, 2004.
Asrar, Shakeeb. ‘Rohingya Crisis Explained in Maps.’ Al Jazeera, 28 October 2017.
Accessed 16 May 2019. https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/interactive/
2017/09/rohingya-crisis-explained-maps-170910140906580.html.
Associated Press. ‘Myanmar, Bangladesh Set Up Working Group for Rohingya
Return.’ Fox News Channel, 19 December 2017. Accessed 26 January 2018.
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/12/19/myanmar-bangladesh-set-up-
working-group-for-rohingya-return.html.
Aziz, Ashraful. Kinship in Bangladesh. Dhaka: International Centre for Diarrhoeal
Disease Research (ICDDRB), 1979.
 Bibliography 229

Bahar, Abid. The Arakani Rohingyas in Burmese Society. Unpublished PhD

dissertation, University of Windsor, Ontario, Canada, 2012.
Banerjee, Paula, Anasua Basu Ray Chaudhury, and Atig Ghosh, eds. The State of
being Stateless: An Account of South Asia. New Delhi: Orient BlackSwan, 2016.
Banglapedia. ‘Shah Barid Khan.’ Accessed 20 March 2018. http://en.banglapedia.
org/index.php?title=Shah_Barid_Khan.
Banks, Marcus. Ethnicity: Anthropological Constructions. London and New York:
Routledge, 1996.
Barth, Fredrik, ed. Ethnic Groups and Boundaries. USA: Little, Brown and
Company, 1969.
———. ‘Models of Social Organizations.’ Occasional papers 23, Royal
Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, 1966.
Barua, Jyotirmoy, ed. Ramu: A Collection of Communal Violence (in Bengali).
Dhaka: Drik, 2013.
Bearak, Max. ‘Aid Group Says Atleast 6,700 Rohingya were Killed in Burma in First
Month of “Ethnic Cleansing”.’ Washington Post, 14 December 2017. Accessed
31 March 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/
2017/12/14/aid-group-says-at-least-6700-rohingya-killed-in-burma-in-first-
month-of-ethnic-cleansing/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5e451a6daa1a.
Belton, Kristy. ‘The Neglected Non-citizen: Statelessness and Liberal Political
Theory.’ The Journal of Global Ethics 7, no. 12 (2011): 59–71.
———. ‘Statelessness: A Matter of Human Rights.’ In The Human Rights to
Citizenship: A Slippery Concept, edited by Rhoda Howard-Hassmann and
Margaret Walton-Roberts, 31–44. Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania
Press, 2015.
Benhabib, Seyla. The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Béteille, André. ‘The Idea of Indigenous People.’ Current Anthropology 39, no. 2
(1998): 187–92.
Bhattacharya, B. ‘Bengal Influence in Arakan, Bengal Past and Present.’ Journal of
the Calcutta Historical Society 33, no. 65–6 (1927): 139–44.
Blitz, Brad K. and Maureen Lynch, eds. Statelessness and Citizenship: A Comparative
Study on the Benefits of Nationality. Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA,
USA: Edward Elgar, 2011.
Brass, P.R. Theft of an Idol: Text and Context in the Representation of Collective
Violence. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997.
British Broadcasting Corporation. ‘Myanmar Rohingya: UN Says Military
Leaders Must Face Genocide Charges.’ 27 August 2018. Accessed 28 October
2018. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-45318982.
Britannica. ‘Battle of Karbala.’ Accessed 20 March 2018. https://www.britannica.
com/event/Battle-of-Karbala.
230 Bibliography

Brown, David. The State and Ethnic Politics in SouthEast Asia. London and New
York: Routledge, 1996.
Buchanan, Francis. ‘A Comparative Vocabulary of Some of the Languages
Spoken in the Burma Empire.’ Asiatic Researches 5 (1799): 219–40.
Butler, J. The Precarious Life: The Power of Mourning and Violence. London and
New York: Verso, 2004.
Cage, Monkey. ‘There’s a Massive Humanitarian Crisis in Bangladesh’s Rohingya
Refugee Camps.’ Washington Post, 12 October 2017. Accessed 2 April 2019.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/10/12/
theres-a-massive-humanitarian-crisis-in-bangladeshs-rohingya-refugee-
camps/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.21b98f13af76.
Callahan, Mary P. Political Authority in Burma’s Ethnic Minority States: Devolution,
Occupation and Coexistence. Washington, DC: East-West Center, 2007.
Chan, Aye. ‘The Development of a Muslim Enclave in Arakan (Rakhine) State
of Burma (Myanmar).’ SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research 3, no. 2 (2005):
396–420.
Chandran, Nyshka. ‘Terror Groups May Take Advantage of Myanmar’s Rohingya
Crisis.’ CNBC, 13 September 2017. Accessed 4 October 2018. https://www.
cnbc.com/2017/09/13/myanmar-rohingya-crisis-islamic-terror-groups-may-
take-advantage.html.
Change.Org. ‘Oxford U. Press, Myanmar Genocide & Its Choice of Dr Leider
as the Expert on Rohingyas.’ Accessed 27 March 2018. https://www.change.
org/p/vice-chancellor-of-oxford-university-re-oxford-u-press-myanmar-
genocide-its-choice-of-dr-leider-as-the-expert-on-rohingyas.
Charney, Michael W. A History of Modern Burma. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2009.
———. ‘Where Jambudipa and Islamdom Converged: Religious Change and the
Emergence of Buddhist Communalism in Early Modern Arakan (Fifteenth to
Nineteenth Centuries).’ PhD dissertation, Department of History, University
of Michigan, 1999.
Chaudet, Didier. ‘The Rohingya Crisis: Impact and Consequences for South
Asia,’ The Journal of Current Affairs 2, no. 2 (2018): 1–17.
Chaudhury, S.B. Ray, and Ranabir Samaddar, eds. The Rohingya in South Asia:
People Without a State. London and New York: Routledge, 2018.
Chowdhury, Mahfuzul, and Nasir Uddin. ‘Of Hurting and Hosting: Crises in
Co-existence with Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh.’ In To Host or To Hurt:
Counter-Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue in Bangladesh, edited by Nasir
Uddin, 31–46. Dhaka: Institute of Culture and Development Research,
(ICDR), 2012.
Chowdhury, M. Ali. Bengal-Arakan Relations. Kolkata: Firma KLM Private
Limited, 2004.
 Bibliography 231

The Classical Journal of 1811. Accessed 7 November 2017. https://archive.org/

details/in. ernet.dli.2015.20962.
Clifford, James. Returns: Becoming Indigenous in the Twenty-First Century.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013.
Clifford, J., and Marcus, G.E, eds. Writing Culture: Poetic and Politics of Ethnography.
Berkeley, CA: California University Press, 1986.
Cochrane, Liam. ‘Rohingya Crisis: Calculated Food Shortages Driving Exodus
from Myanmar: Rights Groups Say.’ ABC News, 18 October 2017. Accessed
20 March 2018. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-18/rohingyas-driven-
from-myanmar-by-food-shortage-rights-groups-say/9060076.
Colls, M.S., and Bu Shan Shwe. ‘Arakan’s Place in the Civilization of the Bay:
A Study of the Coinage and Foreign Relations.’ In The Rohingyas of Arakan:
History and Heritage, edited by Mohibullah Siddiquee, 135–66. Chittagong:
Ali Publishing House, 2014.
Corcos, Alain F. Three Biological Myths: Race, Ancestry, Ethnicity. USA: Wheatmark,
2018.
Crabtree, Kristy. ‘Economic Challenges and Coping Mechanisms in Protracted
Displacement: A Case Study of the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh.’ Journal
of Muslim Mental Health 5, no. 1 (2010): 41–58.
Daily Independent. ‘Rohingyas Outnumber Locals in Ukhiya, Teknaf.’ 27 October
2017. Accessed 6 April 2014. http://www.theindependentbd.com/post/120913.
Daily Star. ‘Donors [Are] Losing Interests in Rohingyas: WFP.’ 14 February 2018.
Accessed 22 March 2018. https://www.thedailystar.net/frontpage/donors-
lose-interest-rohingyas-wfp-1534360.
———. ‘3 NGOs Barred from Relief Works for Rohingyas.’ 1 October 2017. Accessed
20 January 2018. https://www.thedailystar.net/myanmar-rohingya-crisis/
three-ngo-barred-relief-works-rohingyas-cox-bazar-bangladesh-1475002.
———. ‘It Can Destabilise Entire South Asia.’ 7 October 2017. Accessed
4 October 2018. https://www.thedailystar.net/backpage/it-can-destabilise-
entire-south-asia-1472773.
Das, V., and D. Poole, eds. Anthropology in the Margins of the State. New Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 2004.
Dawson, Matt. Social Theory for Alternative Societies. London & New York:
Palgrave MacMillan, 2016.
Donovan, Sarah. Genocide Literature in Middle and Secondary Classrooms: Rhetoric,
Witnessing, and Social Action in a Time of Standards and Accountability. London
and New York: Routledge, 2016.
Douglas, Mary. 1966. Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and
Taboo. London: Routledge, 2001.
Eaton, Richard M. The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204–1760. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1993.
232 Bibliography

Economist. ‘The Rohingya Refugee Crisis Is the Worst in Decades.’ 21 September

2017. Accessed 21 March 2018. https://www.economist.com/blogs/
graphicdetail/2017/09/daily-chart-13.
Elliot, Alice, and Laura Menin. ‘For an Anthropology of Destiny.’ HAU: Journal of
Ethnographic Theory 8, no. ½ (2018): 292–9.
Eriksen, T. Hylland Ethnicity and Nationalism: Anthropological Perspectives.
London: Pluto Press, 2002.
Evans-Pritchard, E.E. 1937. Witchcraft, Oracles, and Magic among the Azande.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976.
Ezzati, Abuˉ al-Faz.l. The Spread of Islam: The Contributing Factors. London: Islamic
College for Advanced Studies Press, 2002.
Fanon, Frantz. 1961. Wretched of the Earth. England: Penguin Books, 2001.
Farzana, K. Fahmida. Memories of Burmese Rohingya Refugees: Contested Identities
and Belonging. London: Palgrave MacMillan, 2017.
Fassin, Didier. ‘Beyond Good and Evil?: Questioning the Anthropological
Discomfort with Morals.’ Anthropological Theory 8, no. 4 (2008): 333–44.
Ferguson, J. The Anti-Politics Machine: ‘Development’, Depoliticization and Bureaucratic
Power in Lesotho. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994.
Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Elena, Gil Loescher, Katy Long, and Nando Sigona The
Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies. Oxford: The Oxford
University Press, 2014.
Fineman, M. ‘The Vulnerable Subject: Anchoring Equality in the Human
Condition.’ Yale Journal of Law and Feminism 20, no. 1 (2008): 1–23.
Flood, Michael, Brian Martin, and Tanja Dreher. ‘Combining Academia and
Activism: Common Obstacles and Useful Tools.’ Austrian Universities Review
55, no. 1 (2013): 17–26.
Forster, Richard. ‘Magh Marauders, Portuguese Pirates, White Elephants and
Persian Poets: Arakan and Its Bay-of-Bengal Connectivities in the Early
Modern Era.’ Explorations 11, no. 1 (2011): 63–80.
Fortes, Meyer. Oedipus and Job in West African Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1959.
Foucault, Michel. The History of Sexuality, Volume 1. Boston, MA: Vantage Books,
1976.
Franco, Nicoletta Del. Negotiating Adolescence in Rural Bangladesh: A Journey
through School, Love and Marriage. New Delhi: Zubaan, 2012.
Fries, Anna. Memories of a Stateless Person. Bloomington: AuthorHouse, 2013.
Fumagalli, Matteo. ‘How Geopolitics Helped Create the Latest Rohingya
Crisis.’ The Conversation, 21 September 2017. Accessed 25 January 2018.
https://theconversation.com/how-geopolitics-helped-create-the-latest-
rohingya-crisis-84309.
 Bibliography 233

Gabiam, Nell. The Politics of Suffering: Syria’s Palestinian Refugee Camps.

Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2016.
Geertz, Clifford. The Interpretation of Culture. New York: Basic Books, 1973.
Gibney, Matthew. Statelessness and the Right to Citizenship. Oxford: Refugee Study
Centre, University of Oxford, 2006.
Goodale, Mark. ‘Between Facts and Norms: Towards an Anthropology of Ethical
Practice.’ In The Anthropology of Moralities, edited by Monica Heintz, 183–99.
Oxford and New York: Berghahn, 2013.
———, ed. Surrendering to Utopia: An Anthropology of Human Rights. Stanford,
California: Stanford University Press, 2009.
Green, P. and T. Ward. State Crime: Governments, Violence and Corruption.
London: Pluto Press, 2004.
Green, Penny, Thomas MacManus, and Alicia de la Cour Venning. Countdown
Annihilation: Genocide in Myanmar. London: International State Crime
Initiative, 2015.
Grundy-Warr, Carl and Elaine Wong. ‘Sanctuary under Plastic Sheet: The
Unresolved Problem of Rohingya Refugees.’ IBRU, Boundary and Security
Bulletin 5, no. 3 (1997): 79–91.
Gupta, A. ‘Blurred Boundaries: The Discourse of Corruption, the Culture of Politics
and the Imagined State.’ American Ethnologist 22, no. 2 (1995): 375–402.
———. Red Tape: Bureaucracy, Structural Violence and Poverty in India. Durham:
Duke University Press, 2012.
Hamilton, W. Geographical, Statistical, and Historical Description of Hindostan and
its Adjacent Countries. London, Albemarle Street: John Murray, 1820.
Hammersley, Martyn and Paul Atkinson. Ethnography: Principles in Practice.
London and New York: Routledge, 2007.
Harvey, G.E. 1925. History of Burma: From the Earliest Time to the 10 March, the
Beginning of the English Conquest. New Delhi and Madras: Asian Education
Services, 2000.
Hatfield, Donald J. ‘Fate in the Narrativity and Experience of Selfhood: A Case
from Taiwanese Chhiam Divination.’ American Ethnologist 29, no. 4 (2002):
857–77.
Homola, Stéphanie. ‘Caught in the Language of Fate: The Quality of Destiny in
Taiwan.’ HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 8, no. ½ (2018): 329–42.
Hossain, Delwar. 2010. ‘Tracing the Plight of the Rohingyas.’ In The Plight of the
Stateless Rohingyas, edited by Imtiaz Ahmed, 11–40. Dhaka: University Press
Limited, 2014.
Hossain, Delwar, and Faridul Alam. ‘Response of the State.’ In The Plight of the
Stateless Rohingyas, edited by Imtiaz Ahmed, 87–106. Dhaka: University Press
Limited, 2010.
234 Bibliography

Howard-Hassmann, Rhoda, and Margaret Walton-Roberts, eds. The Human

Rights to Citizenship: A Slippery Concept. Pennsylvania: University of
Pennsylvania Press, 2015.
Howell, Signe. The Ethnography of Moralities. London and New York: Routledge,
1997.
Human Rights Now. ‘Investigative Report of Rohingya Refugee Camps in
Bangladesh.’ Accessed 18 August 2018, http://hrn.or.jp/eng/wp-content/
uploads/2018/04/Investigative-Report-of-Rohingya-Refugee-Camps-in-
Bangladesh.pdf.
Hungerford, Amy. The Holocaust of Texts: Genocide, Literature and Representation.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.
Hussain, Maaz. ‘Rohingyas Say They Won’t Return to Myanmar Now.’ The Voice
of America, 6 March 2018.
Hussain, Misha. ‘For Rohingya in Bangladesh, No Place is Home.’ Times,
19 February 2010. Accessed 1 August 2012. http://www.time.com/time/world/
article/0,8599,1966621,00.html.
Hutchinson, Susan. ‘Gendered Insecurity in the Rohingya Crisis.’ Australian
Journal of International Affairs 72, no. 1 (2017): 1–9.
Ibrahim, Azeem. The Rohingyas: Inside Myanmar’s Hidden Genocide. London:
Hurst & Company, 2016.
Iqbal, Iftekhar. ‘Locating the Rohingya in Time and Space’, In the Shadow of
Violence, Daily Star (Star Weekend), 13 October 2017. Accessed 28 March
2020. https://www.thedailystar.net/star-weekend/the-shadow-violence/
locating-the-rohingya-time-and-space-1475248.
Islam, M. Rezaul. NGOs, Social Capital, and Community Empowerment in
Bangladesh. Singapore: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016.
Jacobsen, Karen. ‘Factors Influencing the Policy Responses of Host Governments
to Mass Refugee Influxes.’ International Migration Review 30, no. 3 (1996):
655–78.
Jenkins, Richard. Rethinking Ethnicity: Arguments and Explorations. Los Angeles,
Delhi, London, and Singapore: SAGE Publications, 2008.
Jilani, Ahmed. The Rohingyas of Arakan: Their Quest for Justice. Dhaka: The
University Press Limited, 1999.
Johnson, Heather L. Borders, Asylum and Global Non-citizenship: The Other Side of
the Fence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014.
Karim, Abdul. The Rohingyas: A Short Account of Their History and Culture.
Chittagong: Arakan Historical Society, 2016.
Karim, Rezaul. NGOs, Social Capital, and Community Empowerment in Bangladesh.
Singapore: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016.
Kenrick, Justin, and Jerome Lewis. ‘Indigenous Peoples’ Rights and the Politics
of the Term “Indigenous”.’ Anthropology Today 20, no. 2 (2004): 4–9.
 Bibliography 235

Kesby, Alison. The Right to Have Rights: Citizenships, Humanity and International
Law. Oxford: The Oxford University Press, 2012.
Khan, Mohammad Abu Sayed Arfin, Mohammed Salim Uddin, Arfin Khan,
and C. Emdad Haque. ‘Rural Livelihood among the Rohingya Refugees in
Bangladesh and Their Impacts on Forests: A Case of the Teknaf Wildlife
Sanctuary.’ In To Host or To Hurt: Counter-Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue
in Bangladesh, edited by Nasir Uddin, 101–18. Dhaka: Institute of Culture
and Development Research, (ICDR), 2012.
Kinley, David, Wojciech Sadurski, Kevin Walton, eds. Human Rights: Old
Problems, New Possibilities. Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA, USA:
Edward Elgar, 2013.
Kiragu, Esther, Angela Li Rosi, and Tim Morris. States of denial: A Review of UNHCR’s
Response to the Protracted Situation of Stateless Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh.
Bangladesh/Myanmar: UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), 2011.
Accessed 3 November 2017. http://www.refworld.org/docid/5142eb7a2.html.
Kohn, N. ‘Vulnerability Theory and the Roles of Government.’ Yale Journal of Law
and Feminism 26, no. 1 (2014): 01–27.
Kristof, N. ‘I Saw a Genocide in Slow Motion.’ New York Times, 2 March
2018. Accessed 28 October 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/02/
opinion/i-saw-a-genocide-in-slow-motion.html.
Kuper, Adam. Anthropology and Anthropologists. The Modern British School. 3rd ed.
London and New York: Routledge, 1996.
Lambek, Michael. Knowledge and Practice in Mayotte: Local Discourses of Islam,
Sorcery, and Spirit Possession. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993.
Larking, Emma. Refugees and the Myth of Human Rights: Life Outside the Pale of the
Law. London and New York: Routledge, 2014.
Lazar, Sian, ed. The Anthropology of Citizenship: A Reader. UK and USA: Wiley-
Blackwell, 2013.
Lee, Ronan. ‘A Politician, Not an Icon: Aung San Suu Kyi’s Silence on Myanmar’s
Muslim Rohingya.’ Islam and Christian–Muslim Relations 25, no. 3 (2014):
321–33.
Leider, Jacque P. ‘Competing Identities and the Hybridized History of the
Rohingyas.’ In Metamorphosis: Studies in Social and Political Change in Myanmar,
edited by Renaud Egreteau and Francois Robinne, 151–78. Singapore: NUS
Press, 2015.
———. ‘Rohingya: The History of a Muslim Identity in Myanmar.’ In The Oxford
Encyclopaedia of Asian History, edited by D. Ludden et al. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2018.
———. ‘Rohingya: The Name, the Movement, the Quest for Identity.’ In Nation
Building in Myanmar, edited by Myanmar EGRESS, 204–55. Myanmar:
Myanmar Peace Center, 2013.
236 Bibliography

Leitich, Keith. ‘Decoding the Past: The Rohingya Origin Enigma.’ Paper pre-
sented at the Third Annual Southeast Asian Studies Symposium, Keble
College, University of Oxford, 22–23 April 2014.
Lewa, Chris. Unregistered Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Crackdown, Forced
Displacement and Hunger. Bangkok: The Arakan Project, 2010.
Lister, Ruth. ‘Inclusive Citizenship: Realizing the Potential.’ Citizenship Studies
11, no. 1 (2007): 49–61.
Loescher, Gil. ‘The UNHCR and World Politics: State Interests vs. Institutional
Autonomy.’ International Migration Review 35, no. 1 (2001): 33–56.
Loescher, Gil, and James Milner. Protracted Refugee Situations: Domestic and
International Security Implications. London and New York: Routledge, 2005.
Lorey, I. State of Insecurity: Government of the Precarious. Translated by A. Derieg.
London/New York: Verso, 2015.
Mahdi, H. Gender and Citizenship: Hausa Women’s Political Identity from the
Caliphate to the Protectorate. Goteborg: Goteborg University, 2006.
Mahdi, Wael. ‘The Rohingya’s Lives in Limbo.’ National, 9 June 2009.
Accessed 25 September 2018. https://www.thenational.ae/world/mena/the-
rohingya-s-lives-in-limbo-1.490350.
Mahmud, Tarek. ‘Infighting Causes Unrest at Rohingya Camps.’ Dhaka Tribune,
4 March 2018. Accessed 10 April 2018. http://www.dhakatribune.com/
bangladesh/nation/2018/03/04/personal-conflicts-cause-unrest-rohingya-
camps/.
———. ‘Over One Million Rohingyas Get Biometric Registration.’ Dhaka Tribune,
18 January 2018. Accessed 20 March 2018. http://www.dhakatribune.com/
bangladesh/2018/01/18/one-million-rohingyas-get-biometric-registration/.
———. ‘Rohingya Influx: Refugees Outnumber Ukhiya, Teknaf Locals.’
Dhaka Tribune, 23 October 2017. Accessed 16 August 2018. https://www.
dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2017/10/23/rohingya-influx-refugees-
outnumber-ukhiya-teknaf-locals/.
———. ‘Suspected Gang Member Killed in Rohingya Turf War’. Dhaka Tribune,
8 March 2018. Accessed 10 April 2018. http://www.dhakatribune.com/
bangladesh/nation/2018/03/08/rohingya-man-shot-coxs-bazar/.
Marcus, G.E., and M.M. Fischer. Anthropology as Cultural Critique: An Experimental
Moment in the Human Sciences. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1986.
Marshall, Thomas H. 1950. Citizenship and Social Class. London: Pluto Press, 1992.
Mathieson, Scott. ‘Plight of the Damned: Burma’s Rohingya.’ Global Asia 4, no.
1 (2009).
Matias, Goncalo. Citizenship as a Human Rights: The Fundamental Rights to a
Specific Citizenship. Singapore: Palgrave MacMillan, 2016.
McConnachie, Kirsten. Governing Refugees: Justice, Order and Legal Pluralism.
London and New York: Routledge, 2014.
 Bibliography 237

Mcdaniel, Mahalia Gaskin, John Leake, and Thomas Wanner. The Politics of
Identity in Myanmar: The Rohingya, Kachin and Wa Ethnic Minorities. Institute
of International Development and the University of Adelaide, 2017.
Médecins Sans Frontiers. 10 Years for the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Past,
Present and Future. 2002.
Min, U Kway, and Shamsul Anwarul Haque. An Assessment of the Question of
Rohingyas’ Nationality. Accessed 30 October 2017. http://www.burmalibrary.
org/docs14/ARAKAN-%20Question_of_Rohingyas_Nationality-red.pdf.
Mogire, Edward. Victims as Security Threats: Refugee Impact on Host State Security
in Africa. England and USA: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2011.
Mountz, Alison. Seeking Asylum: Human Smuggling and Bureaucracy at the Border.
Minneapolis and London: Minnesota University Press, 2010.
Naing, Shoon. ‘Bulldozing Rohingya Villages Was Not “Demolition of Evidence”,
Myanmar Official Says.’ Reuters, 26 February 2008. Accessed 20 March 2018.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-rohingya-enterprise/bulldozing-
rohingya-villages-was-not-demolition-of-evidence-myanmar-official-says-
idUSKCN1GA0VH.
———. ‘Rights Group Accuses Myanmar of Crimes against Humanity.’ Reuters,
26 September 2017. Accessed 25 January 2018. https://www.reuters.com/
article/us-myanmar-rohingya/rights-group-accuses-myanmar-of-crimes-
against-humanity-idUSKCN1C10MR.
Nando, Sigona. ‘Campzenship: Reimagining the Camp as a Social and Political
Space.’ Citizenship Studies 19, no. 1 (2015): 1–15.
Nash, Kate. ‘Between Citizenship and Human Rights.’ Sociology 43, no. 6 (2009):
1067–83.
Oppenheim, Marella. ‘“It Only Takes One Terrorist”: The Buddhist Monk Who
Reviles Myanmar’s Muslims.’ Guardian, 12 May 2017. Accessed 17 March 2019.
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2017/may/12/only-
takes-one-terrorist-buddhist-monk-reviles-myanmar-muslims-rohingya-
refugees-ashin-wirathu.
Palmer, Victoria. ‘Analysing Cultural Proximity: Islamic Relief Worldwide and
the Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh.’ Development in Practice 21, no. 1
(2011): 96–108.
Parnini, Syeda Naushin, ‘The Crisis of the Rohingya as a Muslim Minority in
Myanmar and Bilateral Relations with Bangladesh.’ Journal of Muslim Minority
Affairs 33, no. 2 (2013): 281–97.
Paul, Ruma, and Yi-Mou Lee. ‘Bangladesh Agrees with Myanmar to Complete the
Rohingya Return in Two Years.’ Reuters, 16 January 2018. Accessed 10 October 2018.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-rohingya-bangladesh/
bangladesh-agrees-with-myanmar-to-complete-rohingya-return-in-two-
years-idUSKBN1F50I2.
238 Bibliography

Phayre, A.P. History of Burma Including Burma People, Pegu, Taungu, Tenasserim,
and Arakan. London: Trubner & Co., 1883.
Phiri, Pia Prytz. ‘Rohingyas and Refugee Status in Bangladesh.’ Forced Migration
Review 30, 2008. Accessed 22 March 2013. https://www.fmreview.org/
burma/phiri.
Pittaway, Eileen. ‘The Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: The Failure of the
International Protection Regime.’ In Protracted Displacement in Asia: No Place
to Call Home, edited by Howard Adelman, 83–104. London and New York:
Routledge, 2008.
Plotke, David. ‘The Rights of Noncitizens: Introduction.’ Politics and Society 42,
no. 3 (2014): 287–91.
Povinelli, Elizabeth. Geontologies: A Requiem to Late Liberalism. Durham: Duke
University Press, 2016.
Pugh, Cresa L. ‘Is Citizenship the Answer? Construction of Belonging and
Exclusion for the Stateless Rohingya of Burma.’ Working Paper No. 107,
International Migration Institute, Oxford University, 2013.
Quadir, Serajul. ‘Rohingya Refugees Still Fleeing from Myanmar to Bangladesh:
UNHCR.’ US NEWS, 7 December 2017. Accessed 22 December 2017.
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-12-07/rohingya-
refugees-still-fleeing-from-myanmar-to-bangladesh-unhcr.
Radio Free Asia. ‘“Several” Suspected Rohingya Insurgents in Custody:
Bangladesh Official.’ 18 April 2018. Accessed 10 October 2018. https://www.
rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/bangladesh-arrests-04182018161609.html.
Rahman, M.Z. ‘Livelihoods of Rohingyas and Their Impacts on Deforestation.’
In Deforestation in the Teknaf Peninsula of Bangladesh, edited by M. Tani and
M. Rahman. Singapore: Springer, 2018.
Rahman, Utpala. ‘Rohingya Refugees: A Security Dilemma for Bangladesh’,
Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies 8, no. 2 (2010): 139–61.
Rashid, Harun ur. ‘Ramu Violence: International Implication.’ Daily Star, 10
October 2012. Accessed 20 January 2018. https://www.thedailystar.net/
news-detail-253124.
Rashid, Muktadir. ‘Restriction of 41 NGOs Irk Development Workers.’ Daily New
Age, 27 August 2018. Accessed 10 October 2018. http://www.newagebd.net/
article/49253/restrictions-on-41-ngos-irk-development-workers.
Razzak, Abdur and Mahfuzul Haque. A Tale of Refugees: Rohingyas in Bangladesh.
Dhaka: Centre for Human Rights, 1995.
Romanucci-Ross, Lola, George A De Vose, and Takeyuki Tsuda, eds. Ethnic
Identity: Problems and Prospects for the Twenty-First Century. Lanham, New
York, Toronto, and Oxford: Altamira Press, 2006.
Rossides, Daniel W. Social Theory: Its Origins, History, and Contemporary Relevance.
New York: General Hall, Inc, 1998.
 Bibliography 239

Safi, Michael. ‘Myanmar Treatment of Rohingya Looks Like “Textbook

Ethnic Cleansing”, says UN.’ Guardian, 11 September 2017. Accessed
28 October 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/11/
un-myanmars-treatment-of-rohingya-textbook-example-of-ethnic-cleansing.
———. ‘“We Cannot Go Back”: Grim Future Facing Rohingya One Year after
Attacks.’ Guardian, 25 August 2018.
Saw, Khin Maung. Islamization of Burma through Chittagonian Bengalis as Rohingya
Refugees. 2001. Accessed 10 November 2017. http://www.burmalibrary.org/
docs21/Khin-Maung-Saw-NM-2011-09-Islamanisation_of_Burma_through_
Chittagonian_Bengalis-en.pdf.
Scott, J.C. Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition
Have Failed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.
Sen, Amartya. Development as Freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2001.
Serajuddin, Alamgir. ‘Muslim Influence in Arakan and the Muslim Names of
Arakanese Kings: A Resentment.’ Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh 31,
no. 1 (1986): 17–23.
Sharma, Aradhana, and Akhil Gupta, eds. The Anthropology of the State: A Reader.
USA, UK and Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2006.
Shehabuddin, Elora. Reshaping the Holy: Democracy, Development, and Muslim
Women in Bangladesh. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008.
Siddiquee, Mohibullah, ed. The Muslims in Arakan: History and Heritage.
Chittagong: The Arakan Historical Society, 2000.
———. ‘Who Are Rohingyas and How? Origin and Development of Rohingyas
in Arakan.’ In To Host or To Hurt: Counter Narratives on the Rohingya
Refugee Issues in Bangladesh, edited by Nasir Uddin, 15–28. Dhaka: ICDR,
2012.
Siddiqui, Habib. The Forgotten Rohingya: Their Struggle for Human Rights in
Burma. Japan. Kindle.
Siddiqui, Zeba. ‘Exclusive: Rohingya Refugee Leaders Draw Up Demands
Ahead of Repatriation.’ Reuters, 19 January 2018. Accessed 6 April 2018.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-myanmar-rohingya-petition-exclusive/
exclusive-rohingya-refugee-leaders-draw-up-demands-ahead-of-
repatriation-idUSKBN1F80SE.
Smith, Rogers M. ‘National Obligations and Noncitizens: Special Rights,
Human Rights, and Immigration.’ Politics & Society 42, no. 3 (2014):
381–98.
Somers, Margaret. Genealogies of Citizenship: Markets, Statelessness and the Right to
Have Rights. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
Stateless Rohingya, The. ‘Populations 2010.’ Accessed 20 October 2017. http://
www.thestateless.com/populations-2010.
240 Bibliography

Sunkara, Bhaskar. ‘Why the Ideas of Karl Marx Are More Relevant than Ever
in the 21st Century.’ Guardian, 25 January 2013. Accessed 20 March 2018.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jan/25/karl-marx-
relevant-21st-century.
Sussman, Robert Wald. The Myth of Race: The Troubling and Persistence of an
Unscientific Idea. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2014.
Taylor, Robert H. The State in Myanmar. Singapore: Singapore National
University Press, 2009.
Tharoor, Ishaan. ‘The World Let a Genocide Unfold.’ Washington Post, 18
December 2017. Accessed. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/
worldviews/wp/2017/12/18/in-2017-the-world-let-a-genocide-unfold/
?utm_term=.7a0d47d96530.
Thwaites, Rayner. The Liberty of Non-citizens: Indefinite Detention in Commonwealth
Countries. UK: Hart Publishing, 2014.
Time. ‘The Face of Buddhist Terror’, 1 July 2013. Accessed 17 March 2019.
http://content.time.com/time/covers/europe/0,16641,20130701,00.html.
Tisdall S. ‘World’s Awkward Silence over Rohingya Genocide Warnings.’
Guardian, 3 January 2018. Accessed 28 October 2018. https://www.
theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/03/worlds-awkward-silence-over-
rohingya-genocide-warnings.
Tonkiss, Katherine, and Tendayi Bloom. ‘Theorising Noncitizenship: Concepts,
Debates and Challenges.’ Citizenship Studies 19, no. 8 (2016): 837–52.
Triandafyllidou, Anna. Routledge Handbook of Immigration and Refugee Studies.
London and New York: Routledge, 2015.
Uddin, Jashim. ‘Prospects for Attaining New Height in Bangladesh-Myanmar
Relations: Bangladesh Perspectives.’ Bangladesh International Institute for
Strategic Studies Journal, 35, no. 1 (2014): 01–22.
Uddin, Mohammed Salim, and Mohammed Abu Sayed Arfin Khan. Comparing
the Impact of Local People and Rohingya Refugees on Teknaf Game Forest. USA:
East-West Center, 2010.
Uddin, Nasir. Commonsense of Scholarship: Indigenous People, Chittagong Hill Tracts
and the Politics of Representation (in Bengali). Dhaka: Institute of Culture and
Development Research or ICDR, 2016.
———. ‘Decolonising Ethnography in the Field: An Anthropological
Account.’ International Journal of Social Research Methodology 14, no. 6
(2011): 455–67.
———. ‘Ethnic Cleansing of the Rohingya People.’ In The Palgrave Handbook
of Ethnicity, edited by S. Ratuva. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019a.
———. ‘Homeless at Home: An Ethnographic Study on the Marginality and
Leadership among the Khumi in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh.’
Unpublished PhD diss., Kyoto University, Kyoto, 2008.
 Bibliography 241

———. ‘Life in Everyday Death: The Rohingyas in Bangladesh and Myanmar.’

Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs, 19 October 2017a. Accessed
21 December 2017. https://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/responses/life-in-
everyday-death-the-rohingyas-in-bangladesh-and-myanmar.
———. ‘The Local Translation of Global Indigeneity: A Case of the Chittagong
Hill Tracts.’ Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 50, no. 1 (2019b): 68–85.
———. Not Rohingyas, but Royainga: Stateless People in the Struggle for Existence
(in Bengali). Dhaka: Murddhanno Publisher, 2017b.
———. ‘Of Hosting and Hurting: Crises in Co-existence with Rohingya Refugees
in Bangladesh.’ In To Host or To Hurt: Counter-Narratives on Rohingya Refugee
Issue in Bangladesh, edited by Nasir Uddin, 83–98. Dhaka: Institute of
Culture and Development Research, (ICDR), 2012a.
———. ‘Ongoing Rohingya Repatriation Efforts Are Doomed to Failure!’
Opinion, Al Jazeera, 22 November 2018a. Accessed 31 March 2019. https://
www.academia.edu/37831623/Ongoing_Rohingya_repatriation_efforts_
are_doomed_to_failure_ .
———. ‘Rohingya Refugees in Bangladesh: Five Challenges for the Future.’ LSE
South Asia (Blog), 21 November 2018b. Accessed 31 March 2019. https://blogs.
lse.ac.uk/southasia/2018/11/21/rohingya-refugees-in-bangladesh-five-
challenges-for-the-future/.
———. ‘The Solutions to the Rohingya Crisis: Voices from the Field.’ South Asia
Journal, 17 November 2018c. Accessed 31 March 2019. http://southasiajournal.
net/the-solutions-to-the-rohingya-crisis-voices-from-the-field/.
———. ‘State of Stateless People: The Plight of Rohingya Refugees in
Bangladesh.’ In Human Rights to Citizens: A Slippery Concept, edited by Rhoda
Howard-Hassmann and Margaret Walton-Roberts, 62–77. USA: University
of Pennsylvania Press, 2015.
———. ‘The State, Vulnerability, and Transborder Movement: The Rohingyas
in Myanmar and Bangladesh.’ In Deterritorialised Identity and Transborder
Movements in South Asia, edited by Nasir Uddin and Nasreen Chowdhory,
73–90. Singapore: Springer, 2019c.
———, ed. To Host or To Hurt: Counter Narratives on Rohingya Refugee Issue in
Bangladesh. Dhaka: Institute for Culture and Development Research (ICDR),
2012b.
———. ‘Treatment of Unwelcome Guests: A Case of the Rohingya Refugees in
Bangladesh.’ Paper presented at an international conference on The Political
Economy of South Asian Migrants by South Asian Region Formation Research
Society at University of Delhi, India, 24–26 November 2010.
———. The Voices of the Victims: The ‘Subhuman’ life of the Rohingya. Unpublished
research monograph on the Rohingya Victims of 2017 campaign in Rakhine
State, 2019d.
242 Bibliography

Uddin, Nasir, and Eva Gerharz. ‘The Many Faces of the State: Living in Peace
and Conflict in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh.’ Society and Conflict 2,
no. 1 (2017): 208–26.
Uddin, Nasir, Eva Gerharz, and Pradeep Chakkarath. ‘Exploring Indigeneity:
Introductory Remarks on a Contested Concept.’ In Indigeneity on the Move:
Varying Manifestations of a Contested Concept, edited by Nasir Uddin, Eva Gerharz,
and Pradeep Chakkarath, 1–25. Oxford and New York: Berghahn, 2018.
Uddin, Nasir, and Nasreen Chowdhory, eds. Deterritoiralised Identity and
Transborder Movement in South Asia. Singapore: Springer, 2019.
Ullah, A.K.M Ahsan. ‘Rohingya Refugees to Bangladesh: Historical Exclusion
and Contemporary Marginalization.’ Journal of Immigration and Refugee
Studies 9, no. 2 (2011): 139–61.
Ullah, Habib. 1995. The History of Rohingyas. Chittagong: Bangladesh Co-operative
Society, 2015.
UNICEF News. ‘More than 60 Rohingya Babies Born in Bangladesh Refugee
Camps Every Day.’ 17 May 2018. Accessed 31 March 2019. https://www.unicef.
org/press-releases/more-60-rohingya-babies-born-bangladesh-refugee-
camps-every-day-unicef.
United Nations. ‘United Nations Declaration for the Rights of Indigenous
People.’ Accessed 30 March 2019. https://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/
documents/DRIPS_en.pdf.
United Nations Action for Cooperation against Trafficking in Persons. ‘Myanmar
Citizenship Law.’ Accessed 22 January 2018. http://un-act.org/publication/
view/myanmars-citizenship-law-1982/.
United Nations Development Programme. ‘Report on Environmental Impact
of Rohingya Influx.’ Accessed 29 September 2018. http://www.bd.undp.
org/content/dam/bangladesh/docs/Reports/Summary%20of%20
Environmental%20Impact%20of%20Refugee%20Influx.pdf.
United Nation General Assembly. Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
Article 15(1), 1948.
United Nations News. ‘UN Agencies and Myanmar Lay Groundwork for
Possible Rohingya Return.’ 1 June 2018. Accessed 2 October 2018. https://
news.un.org/en/story/2018/06/1011171.
———. ‘UN Human Rights Chief Points to “Textbook Example of Ethnic
Cleansing” in Myanmar.’ Global Perspective on Human Stories, 11 September 2017.
Accessed 27 January 2018. https://news.un.org/en/story/2017/09/564622-
un-human-rights-chief-points-textbook-example-ethnic-cleansing-
myanmar#.Wj4_SZugeM8OperaStable\Shell\Open\Command.
United News of Bangladesh (UNB). ‘Rohingya Women Gang-Raped by Myanmar
Army.’ Daily Star, 13 November 2017. Accessed 26 January 2018. https://www.
thedailystar.net/frontpage/rohingya-girls-gang-raped-myanmar-army-
1490278.
 Bibliography 243

———. ‘UN: New Rohingya Arrivals from Myanmar Now 646,000.’ Dhaka Tribune,
9 December 2017. Accessed 2 January 2018. http://www.dhakatribune.com/
bangladesh/2017/12/09/un-rohingya-arrival-bangladesh/.
Vaessen, Step. ‘Rohingya Crisis: A Threat to Stability in Southeast Asia.’ Al Jazeera,
10 September 2017. Accessed 4 October 2018. https://www.aljazeera.com/
blogs/asia/2017/09/rohingya-crisis-threat-stability-southeast-asia-
170910173120308.html.
Vandekerckhove, Nel. ‘We Are Sons of this Soil’: The Endless Battle Over
Indigenous Homelands in Assam, India.’ Critical Asian Studies 41, no. 4
(2009): 523–48.
Vater, J.S., ed. Examples of German Vernaculars: Dr. Seetzen’s Linguistic Legacy and
Other Linguistic Research and Collections, in Particular on East India. Leipzig:
Gerhard Fleischer, the Disciple, 1816.
Wade, Francis. Myanmar’s Enemy Within: Buddhist Violence and the Making of a
Muslim ‘Other’. London: ZED Books, 2017.
Wahra, Gawher Nayeem. ‘Women Refugees in Bangladesh.’ Gender and
Development 2, no. 1 (1994): 45–9.
Ware, Anthony, and Constas Laoutides. Myanmar’s ‘Rohingya’ Conflict. London:
Hurst & Company, 2018.
Weiner, Myron. ‘Rejected Peoples and Unwanted Migrants in South Asia.’
Economic and Political Weekly 28, no. 34 (1993): 1737–46.
Weissbrodt, David. The Human Rights of Non-citizens. USA: Oxford University
Press, 2008.
Welle, Deutsche. ‘Myanmar Continues to Destroy Rohingya Villages.’ Egypt
Independent, 18 December 2017. Accessed 20 March 2018. http://www.
egyptindependent.com/myanmar-continues-destroy-rohingya-villages-hrw/.
Wildman, Sarah. ‘The World’s Fastest-Growing Refugee Crisis is Taking Place in
Myanmar.’ VOX News, 18 September 2017. Accessed 9 April 2018. https://
www.vox.com/world/2017/9/18/16312054/rohingya-muslims-myanmar-
refugees-violence.
Wimmer, Andreas. ‘The Making and Unmaking of Ethnic Boundaries: A
Multilevel Process Theory.’ American Journal of Sociology 113, no. 4 (2008):
970–1022.
Yunus, Mohammed. A History of Arakan: Past & Present. Chittagong: Magenta
Colour, 1994.
Zarni, Maung, and Alice Cowley. ‘Slow-Burning Genocide of Myanmar’s
Rohingyas.’ Pacific Rim Law & Policy Journal 23, no. 3 (2014): 683–754.
Index
Agamben, Giorgio, 84, 170
Akhanda, Mahfuzur Rahman, 9
Alaol, 7, 23n44
Amnesty International (AI), 19
anti-Rohingya sentiments, 86–7, 197
Arakanese Muslim refugees, 45
Arakan kings, 224
Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army
(ARSA), 20n1
Arakan state, 7, 29, 44, 114, 174
emergence of Islam in, 31
Muslim settlement in, 32–3
state population by township,
2010, 213
villages and rivers, 208
Arendt, Hannah, 83, 91
Asad, Talal, 120
asylum seekers, 3, 22n19
Balukhali, 20n4, 137
Bamars, 39–40, 113, 214
Bangladesh
cases of Rohingyas in, 152–4
classic representation of state in,
120–4
law enforcement agencies, 120
local government, 127
state formation and nation
building, 125
stateless status of Rohingyas in,
124–5
Bangladeshi perspectives on
Rohingyas, 7–8, 65–8, 77n1,
85–102, 114–15, 124
as a burden, 86, 135–6
damages to local ecology, 98–100
forced repatriation, 87
interethnic marriages, 94–7
militant activities, 100–2
relationship with locals, 92–3,
125–6
relation with state, 85–92, 127–9
repatriation process, 88
resource sharing, 93–4
threat of the ‘Other’, 94–7
unemployment, 97–8
Bangladesh–Myanmar bilateral
relations, 11
Bangladesh Population Census 2011,
77n2
bare life, 4, 18, 84, 123, 129, 136,
163, 168, 170, 188

Barth, Fredrik, 27–8, 38
Bengal–Arakan relations, 8
Bengalis–Rohingyas violent clashes,
15, 25n75
human rights violations, 74, 115
interethnic marriages, 94–7
narratives, 72–5
principal causes, 73–4, 76, 93
bio-politics, 48, 111
blame game, 65–6
Bodawpaya, King, 45
Brass, Paul, 125
Buchanan, Francis, 30
Building Recourses Across
Community (BRAC), 90
Burma/Myanmar, 17–19, 39–44
armed rebellion, 1948, 45
dealing with Rohingyas, 3–4
democratization process, 200–1
dominant class of, 40
human rights violations, 79n14,
103
Myanmar Citizenship Law, 45–6,
50n7
politics of inclusion and
exclusion, 46–7
process of state formation and
nation building in, 45–6
relationship with Bangladesh,
102–3
state narratives about Rohingyas,
34–5
vulnerabilities of Rohingya lives in,
20n1, 111–13, 142–9, 156–64
Butler, Judith, 112
camp people, 3
Chittagonian people, 71
Chowdhury, Mohammad Ali, 8
citizenship, 17, 83, 91, 110, 174
as a legal status, 7
Index 245
slippery, 84, 92
theories of, 6
classic representation of state, 120–4
Compressed Natural Gas scooters,
20n2
Cox’s Bazar, 13, 15, 38, 63, 71, 85
Crabtree, Kristy, 10, 86
cultural pluralism, 200
Das, Veena, 120
earliest migrants, 40
Elliot, Alice, 116
environmental impact of Rohingya
influx, 98–100, 107n41
ethnic
boundary, 28, 38, 50n4
cleaning, 13, 19, 113, 171–2
identity formation, 28, 38
ethnicity of Rohingya, 8, 16, 29,
37–44
Barth’s theoretical positioning,
38–9
communal riots between Rakhine
Buddhists and Rohingyas, 45
ethnic and linguistic difference
from Bengalis, 38
ethnic composition, 44–9
as illegal Bengali migrants, 41–4
linguistic culture, 38–9
as people of the soil of Burma/
Myanmar, 41
rights and entitlements, 38
sociocultural variables, 38
ethnographic research, 137
European Union (EU), 19
Fanon, Franz, 2
‘fate’ and ‘destiny’, idea of, 115–18
fate of Rohingyas, 115–18
Ferguson, James, 119
246 Index
Fineman, Martha, 112
Fitch, Relph, 29
forced migrants, 3
forcibly displaced Myanmar nationals
(FDMN), 4, 21n18, 63, 111, 118
Foucault, Michel, 48, 111
Frazer, James, 137
Gabiam, Nell, 65
gender issue, 10
genocide, 11
geontologies, 48
Gibney, Matthew, 91
Green, Penny, 112
Gupta, Akhil, 119–20
Hanafi, Hazrat Mohammad Bin, 31
Haque, Mahfuzul, 7
hosting and hurting of refugees,
17, 59–65
discourse of, 60–5, 71–7
treatment of host community as
hurting, 71–7
human rights, anthropology of, 6
Human Rights Now, 79n14
human rights violations, 7, 49, 71,
74, 79n14, 103, 115, 118, 189
Human Rights Watch (HRW), 19
illegal bodies, 170
indigenous people, defining and
identifying, 39
parameter for identification, 40
interethnic marriages, 94–7
International Labour Organization
(ILO), 19
International Organization for
Migration (IOM), 2, 19, 20n7
Karbala, Battle of, 31, 52n27
Karim, Abdul, 7
Kheyapari, Queen, 31
Kutupalong, 15, 20n3, 21, 47, 63,
87, 137
Lewa, Chris, 10, 87
living conditionality, 18
local state, dimensions of, 120
Lorey, Isabell, 113
majoritarian statehood, 113
marriages by elopement, 61, 94–7
family acceptance and social
recognition of Rohingya as
spouse, 61
narratives, 62–3
Matias, Goncalo, 189
Menin, Laura, 116
Mia, Hasan, 117
migration trends and patterns, 113–15
life after, 196–8
reasons for Rohingyan migration
to Bangladesh, 114
militant activities of Rohingyas, 100–2
Moghs, 2, 20n8, 141–2, 145, 148–9,
151–2, 154–5, 158, 161–2, 184–8
Mohibullah, 29
Moon, Mun Shaw (Normikhla),
King, 32
Morgan, Lewis Henry, 136
Mountz, Alison, 59
Muslims ‘Others,’ 12, 94–7
Myanmar Citizenship Law, 45–6,
50n7, 118, 164, 174, 180
Ne Win, General, 45–6
non-citizens/non-citizenship/
statelessness, 3–7, 83–4, 110, 168,
188–9
lives of, 84
non-governmental organizations
(NGOs), 10

Operation Clean and Beautiful
Nation, 118
Operation Dragon, 46
Operation Nagamin, 114, 118
Palestinian refugees, in Syria, 65
Palmer, Victoria, 10
people of the soil, 40–4
Phayre, A.P., 32
Phiri, Prytz, 89
Pittaway, Eileen, 10
Poole, Deborah, 120
Povinelli, Elizabeth, 48
distinction between ‘lives’ and
‘non-lives’, 57n104
power relations, 119–20
precarious life, 112
Rahman, Utpala, 10
Rakhine Buddhists, 45
Rakhine State, 1–2, 11–12, 16, 29,
43–4, 49, 87, 201
cases of Rohingyas in, 138–42,
150–2, 164
Ramu incidents, 100, 107n43
Rangoon University, 42
Rangoon University Arakan Muslims
Association, 42
Rangoon University Central Students’
Union, 41–2
Rashiduddin, 29
Razzak, Abdur, 7
reciprocal relations, 66–8
refugee camps, 15, 126
health and disease in, 89–90
living conditions, 89
rehabilitation of refugees, 13, 60, 103
relief programmes for Rohingyas, 10
repatriation of Rohingya refugees, 10,
19, 47, 59, 85–8, 91, 99, 101, 103,
105n15, 177–81, 197–8, 200, 203
Index 247
Rohang, 29–30
Rohingya language, 114
Rohingya organizations, 207
Rohingya refugees, 78n9, 104n9–10
access to healthcare system and
food, 63–4
in Bangladesh. See Bangladeshi
perspectives on Rohingyas
crisis, 8–9, 46–7, 58–9
future of, 203–4
historical and political
dimensions of, 12
human rights violations, 60, 71–7,
79n14
impact on local society, 66, 72–6
issue of unregistered refugees,
47–8
marriages, 61–3
naming and shaming of, 98
narratives on, 66–8
relationship between host society
and refugees, 64–5, 68–71,
92–3, 198–9
as security issue, 10
short-term and long-term
consequences, 199–200
Rohingyas
ancestry, 30
of Arakan, 30, 41, 43
in Bangladesh, 47
criminal activities and crime rate,
64, 66, 71–2, 121
ethnography, 4
etymology, 29–30, 49n2
historical background, 30–5
history of political representation,
43–4
identity, 27
politics of discrimination and
atrocities, 35–7, 48
structural exclusions of, 40
248 Index
Rohingya Solidarity Organization
(RSO), 109n53
Rosaing, 29–30
Rowshang, 29–30
Sandia, Mohathaing, 32
Scott, James, 119
self-settled Rohingyas, 48
Shah, Sultan Gias Uddin Azam, 32
Shah, Sultan Jalal Uddin
Mohammad, 32
Sharma, Aradhana, 119
Shehabuddin, Elora, 61
Siddiquee, Mohibullah, 9
slippery citizenship, 84, 92
social integration of Rohingya
refugees, 8, 16–17, 58, 70, 73, 77,
81n39, 86, 92, 131n11, 204
‘social organisation of cultural
differences’, 27–8
state crime, idea of, 112
stateless people, 45, 49, 70, 83–86,
101–102, 110–11, 117–18, 168,
170, 202. See also Bangladeshi
perspectives on Rohingyas;
non-citizens/non-citizenship/
statelessness
as illegal human bodies or
animals, 18
international conventions on,
83
vulnerability of, 4, 17
stateness, notions of, 124–6
subhuman, notion of, 14, 18–19, 84,
91, 104, 124, 167–8, 201–3
atrocious living conditions,
169–170
concept of ‘legal bodies’ and
‘illegal objects’, 170
ethnic cleansing and, 171–2
features of, 6
free license to be killed, raped,
and burnt, 171
homeless, 170–1
life, 6
narratives, 181–8
notion of, 4–5
Suu Kyi, 201
Tylor, E.B., 136
Ullah, A.K.M. Ahsan, 10
Ullah, Habib, 9
unilinear nationhood, 113
United Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR), 2, 47,
64, 111
United Nations International
Children’s Education Fund
(UNICEF), 19
United Nations (UN), 19, 85, 103,
180, 200
Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, 83, 110, 129
unregistered Rohingyas, 15, 47,
57n98, 63, 67, 85, 87, 89–91, 98,
103, 105n15, 121
vulnerabilities of Rohingya lives, 3,
11, 110, 135–6, 172–5
atrocious living conditions, 113
case narratives, 138–65, 175–8
cases of sexual violence and rape,
91–2
‘fate’ and ‘destiny,’ idea of, 115–18
Lailee’s narrative, experiences, and
present conditions, 2
in Myanmar, 111–13
Wahra, Gawher Nayeem, 10
Walton-Roberts, Margaret, 84, 92
Ward, Tony, 112
About the Author

Nasir Uddin is a cultural anthropologist and professor of anthropology

at the University of Chittagong, Bangladesh. Uddin studied and carried
out research at the University of Oxford (UK), SOAS at the University of
London (UK), the London School of Economics (LSE) at the University
of London (UK), Heidelberg University (Germany), Vrije Universiteit
Amsterdam (The Netherlands), Ruhr-University Bochum (Germany),
Delhi School of Economics at the University of Delhi (India), the
University of Hull (UK), Kyoto University (Japan), and the University
of Dhaka (Bangladesh).
He has been presented with and earned many prestigious awards
and fellowships including the Japanese MEXT Scholarship, British
Academy visiting scholarship, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
fellowship, visiting scholarship at LSE, and visiting fellowship at the
University of Oxford. His research interests include refugees, statelessness,
and citizenship; deterritoriality of identity and transborder movements;
indigeneity and identity politics; notions of power and the state in
everyday life; borderlands between Bangladesh and Myanmar as
well as Bangladesh and India; the Rohingyas; the Chittagong Hill
Tracts; and South Asia in general. He has edited books including Life
in Peace and Conflict: Indigeneity and State in the Chittagong Hill Tracts
(2017), Indigeneity on the Move: Varying Manifestations of a Contested
Concept (2017 [co-edited with Eva Gerharz and Pradeep Chakkarath]),
and Deterritorialised Identity and Transborder Movement in South Asia (2019
[co-edited with Nasreen Chowdhory]).