The 2015 Rohingya refugee crisis refers to the forcible displacement of Myanmar nationals from the Rakhine state of Myanmar to neighboring Bangladesh , collectively referred as “boat people” by international media. The Rohingyans are the majority of Muslim, who have lived for centuries in the majority Buddhist Myanmar and considered as “Stateless Entities as the Myanmar government do not recognise them as “Ethnic Group”
After the Myanmar got independence in 1948 and the Union Citizenship Act was passed stating which ethnicities could gain citizenship it did not included Rohingyans however, allowed those families who lived in Myanmar for at least two generations to apply for identity cards. But after the military coup things changed dramatically , all citizens were required to obtain national registration cards. The Rohingya, however, were only given foreign identity cards, which limited the jobs and educational opportunities they could pursue. In 1982, a new citizenship law was passed, which again rendered the Rohingyans stateless. Under the new law, they were again not recognised as one of the country’s 135 ethnic groups. In order to obtain the citizenship,firstly they have to proof that the person’s family lived in Myanmar before 1948 ,and secondly fluency in one of the national languages. Many Rohingya lack such paperwork because it was either unavailable or denied to them. They were even denied from thier right to caste vote.
The first incident of the crisis occured in the beginning of 2012when a group of Rohingya men were accused of the rape and murder of a Buddhist woman and Buddhist nationalists retaliated by killing and burning Rohingya homes. The Human Rights Watch Community responded by denouncing this “campaign of ethnic cleansing”but the government has consistently denied such accusations..
In 2015, government of Myanmar systematically isolated the ethnic minority which resulted in the migration of thousands of Rohingyas to Bangladesh, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.Again in 2016,Myanmar Military started exploitation against Rohingyas which resulted in thier migration towards Bangladesh as refugees and during this course many refuges camps were burned by special forces at Myanmar boader. Many Rohingyan women were gang raped, men and kids killed. The refugee boats were gunned fire by Military.
Most Rohingyans have sought refuge in nearby Bangladesh, which has limited resources and land to host refugees.As of October 2018, eighty thousand Rohingyans were in Malaysia, according to the UN Report, they have no legal status and are unable to work, leaving their families cut off from access to education and health care .Thailand serves as a common transit point for Rohingya .They have also sought refuge in Indonesia, although the number of refugees from Myanmar there remains relatively small because they are treated as illegal immigrants. Till now Rohingyans were not entering into India but when all the doors got closed for them they entered into India through various routes and spread over a large area across various states. They have their camps in Assam, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.
Most of the Rohingya Muslims living in India are registered with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), known as UN Refugee agency.International organisations have appealed to India not to deport the Rohingyas. But, the government has stated that its decision to deport Rohingyas concerns the state of security. Further, India is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention of the UN or the 1967 Protocol and does not have a refugee specific law and the matter falls under the Foreigners Act of 1946, which makes undocumented physical presence of a foreigner in India a crime and also empowers the government to detain a foreigner living illegally in the country till that person is deported.
Based on this, the MHA has issued Long Term Visas to persons recognised as “refugees” by the government or UNHCR. These included people from various countries, religions or ethnicities. However in 2015 and 2016, the government amended The Passport Rules and the Foreigners Order, thus exempting Hindu, Sik Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian illegal migrants from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan, seeking shelter in India due to religious persecution these discriminatory notifications conspicuously omit Muslimrefugees and became the precursor for the Citizenship Amendment Act passed in 2019. In the last hearing of the Rohingya case in October 2018, even the Honorable Supreme Court refused to stay the deportation of seven Rohingya men detained in Assam since 2012, despite constitutional protections, humanitarian obligations and binding international law commitments. This resulted in the first return of refugees to Myanmar since the outbreak of the extreme violence. The Supreme Court refused to interfere in the deportation despite these claims being gross incorrect, The treatment of Rohingya refugees by this government, read along with the
notifications amending the Passport Rules and Foreigners Order of 2015-2016, and the CAA, all display a discriminatory and hostile attitude towards them.
So far, there is no notable improvement of the solution. The international sides have not yet shown any interest to come to unified agreement regarding Rohingya. The aids and human rights organizations only working with government of Bangladesh in providing food, clothes and other necessities. But, the real solution lies on the returning of these people either to go back to Myanmar with all basic citizen rights or arrangement of permanent shelter in some other countries as refugees recognized by those governments.
–KRITI SAKUJA
Deeksha Chugh 