A Detailed Academic Paper
Systematic Dispossession and Demographic Transformation: Assessing Claims of Ethnic Cleansing Against the Jumma Peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh
Abstract
The Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of Bangladesh remain one of South Asia’s most enduring internal conflict zones, characterised by profound institutional neglect and systemic human rights abuses. This paper critically examines the assertion that the Indigenous peoples of the CHT, collectively known as the Jumma, are facing a slow but accelerating process tantamount to ethnic cleansing. Drawing upon historical records, institutional policies, and contemporary reports of forced internal migration, land grabbing, and militarisation, the analysis argues that state-sponsored demographic engineering, coupled with the non-implementation of the 1997 CHT Peace Accord, constitutes a systematic campaign aimed at the territorial, political, and cultural marginalisation—if not outright elimination—of the Jumma identity within their ancestral homeland. We evaluate these dynamics against established international definitions of ethnic cleansing, concluding that the combination of systematic land dispossession and targeted violence meets the threshold criteria for this classification, driven by internal colonial structures and nationalist aspirations for a singular Bengali state.
Keywords: Ethnic Cleansing, Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), Jumma Peoples, Internal Colonialism, Land Grabbing, Bangladesh, Demographic Engineering, Indigenous Rights.
1. Introduction
The Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), a region comprising three districts (Rangamati, Khagrachari, and Bandarban) in southeastern Bangladesh, is home to eleven distinct Indigenous ethnic groups, collectively known as the Jumma Peoples. Historically autonomous under British colonial rule via the CHT Regulation of 1900, the region’s legal protections were progressively eroded following Bangladesh’s independence in 1971. The subsequent four decades have been marked by intense conflict, primarily fuelled by the construction of the Kaptai Dam in the 1960s, and, most crucially, state-sponsored programmes encouraging the massive influx of Bengali settlers starting in the late 1970s.
This paper addresses a central and contentious question: Does the ongoing political programme and subsequent violence in the CHT constitute ethnic cleansing? While the term ‘ethnic cleansing’ is highly charged and requires rigorous substantiation, the evidence points towards a sustained, systematic effort to displace the Indigenous population, destroy their socio-economic structures, and eradicate their distinct culture—the very essence of cleansing as defined by international legal frameworks.
The core thesis of this paper is that the Bangladeshi state’s policies—specifically the strategic demographic engineering and the persistent militarisation of the CHT—have created conditions of perpetual violence and insecurity designed to facilitate the systematic territorial dispossession of the Jumma Peoples, thereby fulfilling the practical criteria of ethnic cleansing.
2. Theoretical Framework: Defining Ethnic Cleansing in the CHT Context
Ethnic cleansing, a term popularised during the Yugoslav Wars, lacks a specific codified definition in international criminal law, though its elements are universally recognised as grave violations of humanitarian law. The United Nations Commission of Experts defined it as "rendering an area ethnically homogeneous by using force or intimidation to remove persons of another ethnic group" (UNSC, 1992). This process often involves:
- Forced population transfer (deportation or forced migration).
- Systematic violence, including massacres, rape, and torture.
- Destruction of cultural, religious, or historical properties.
- Institutional discrimination and legal mechanisms supporting dispossession.
The situation in the CHT, termed by some scholars as ‘internal colonialism’ (Amnesty International, 2013; Survival International, 2020), is characterised not by mass, rapid genocide, but by a "slow, calculated process" of attrition. This process leverages three primary mechanisms:
- Political Motivation: The insistence on a unified Bengali national identity that rejects the recognition of Jumma distinctiveness (Shelley, 1992).
- Territorial Motivation: The strategic appropriation of CHT lands for national development, military bases, and resettlement of the landless Bengali population from the plains (Mohsin, 2003).
- Demographic Manipulation: Deliberately shifting the population ratio to turn the Jumma into an insignificant minority in their traditional territories.
For the purpose of this analysis, we argue that the CHT case aligns closely with the practical outcomes of ethnic cleansing, where the goal is the permanent removal or subjugation of a minority group through institutional means and violence, even if the state denies genocidal intent.
3. Historical Roots of Dispossession and Conflict
The current crisis has two significant historical policy precedents:
3.1. The Erosion of Autonomy (1900–1971)
The CHT Regulation of 1900 provided the Jumma communities with the legal right to their land, prohibiting land transfer to non-residents without explicit permission from tribal authority. This protection was severely undermined in the 1960s with the construction of the Kaptai Hydroelectric Dam. The dam submerged 40% of the CHT's prime arable land and displaced over 100,000 Chakma people—approximately one-quarter of the region's population—without adequate compensation or resettlement (van Schendel, 2002). This act constituted the first massive, state-sanctioned involuntary displacement, setting a precedent for viewing Jumma land as expendable national property.
3.2. State-Sponsored Demographic Engineering (1979–1984)
Following the failure to accommodate Jumma demands for constitutional recognition in post-1971 Bangladesh, the Government initiated a systematic programme to settle hundreds of thousands of landless Bengali families from the plains into the CHT. This scheme was orchestrated by the military and provided settlers with land, financial incentives, and military protection (Mohsin, 2003).
Prior to 1947, the Jumma constituted over 90% of the CHT population. By the early 1990s, they had been reduced to barely 50% in many regions, and today, in several upazilas, they are the minority (CHT Commission, 2017). This policy represents the most aggressive form of demographic engineering used in classic ethnic cleansing campaigns globally: the strategic replacement of the indigenous population to collapse their demographic and political power.
4. The Mechanisms of Contemporary Ethnic Cleansing
The primary mechanisms employed in the CHT today are violence, militarisation, and land-grabbing, all operating within a framework of impunity and institutional paralysis.
4.1. Militarisation and Impunity
The CHT is one of the most heavily militarised regions in the world, maintaining an estimated one military or paramilitary official for every 10–12 civilians (CHT Commission, 2017). This military presence is officially maintained for ‘security,’ but its function extends to providing protection, logistical support, and land validation for illegal Bengali settlements.
Reports by human rights organisations consistently document severe abuses committed by security forces and armed settler groups, including:
- Extrajudicial killings and disappearances.
- Sexual violence against Jumma women as a tool of terror and humiliation.
- Forcible conversion and the destruction of Buddhist and Christian places of worship (Amnesty International, 2013).
- Intimidation campaigns forcing Jumma villagers to leave their ancestral lands, often followed immediately by the seizure of that land by Bengali settlers.
Crucially, the government maintains the power to prosecute military personnel only with prior government sanction (Indemnity Act), ensuring a near-total impunity for all human rights violations committed in the region.
4.2. Land Dispossession as the Primary Weapon
The struggle in the CHT is fundamentally a struggle over land, which tribal law defines collectively, but which the state attempts to define individually under plain-land legislation, ignoring complex jhum (shifting cultivation) practices.
Land grabbing occurs in several overlapping ways, often with state complicity:
- Direct Military Acquisition: Military bases, cantonments, and training areas are established on customary Jumma lands without consultation or compensation.
- Settler Encroachment: Settlers, often backed by political elites, illegally occupy lands vacated by intimidated Jumma families or lands deemed ‘unoccupied’ by plain-land legal definitions, often using forged documents.
- Corporate Exploitation: Increasing acquisition of land for commercial plantations (rubber, tobacco) and tourism infrastructure, displacing villagers who rely on the land for subsistence (Chakma, 2019).
The result is the fragmentation of Jumma communities, forcing them to depend on increasingly smaller, less productive plots, leading to chronic food insecurity and internal displacement (displaced Jumma). This economic strangulation serves as a powerful push factor, coercing people into leaving the region permanently—a classic outcome of slow-motion ethnic cleansing.
4.3. The Paralysis of the 1997 Peace Accord
The 1997 Peace Accord, signed between the Government of Bangladesh and the political wing of the Jumma resistance (PCJSS – Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti), was intended to resolve the conflict. It promised the demilitarisation of the CHT, the formation of a Regional Council (granting a degree of administrative autonomy), and the establishment of a Land Dispute Resolution Commission (LDRC).
However, key components have been stalled or ignored. Crucially, the military presence has largely remained, and the LDRC was effectively rendered impotent for decades due to constitutional challenges and a lack of procedural authority (CHT Commission, 2017). Even after judicial amendments were made to empower the Commission in 2016, political will has remained absent. The paralysis of the LDRC ensures that illegal land transactions and settler encroachments cannot be legally reversed, institutionalising dispossession and cementing the demographic shift.
5. Cultural Erasure and the Threat to Identity
Ethnic cleansing is not solely a physical act; it is also the systematic elimination of cultural markers essential to group survival. In the CHT, this is manifested through:
- Linguistic Marginalisation: The government’s continued insistence on Bengali as the sole official language of education and administration, despite the existence of multiple unique Jumma languages, undermines cultural transmission.
- Religious Intolerance: The region has seen increasing incidents of arson and attacks on Buddhist temples and Christian churches, often linked to hardline Bengali nationalist sentiment, designed to create a hostile environment for non-Muslim communities.
- Assimilation Pressures: The introduction of government programmes explicitly aimed at integrating Indigenous children into the Bengali national identity, often necessitating migration to the plains for education and employment, undermines the continuity of traditional Jumma culture and governance structures.
6. Conclusion: A Systematic Campaign of Cleansing
The evidence gathered across decades—spanning forced migration, targeted violence, deliberate demographic engineering, institutionalised impunity, and the systematic destruction of land rights—strongly suggests that the Jumma Peoples of the CHT are facing a sustained and systematic campaign of marginalisation that aligns with the criteria for ethnic cleansing.
This process is insidious, relying less on single, catastrophic events and more on continuous, low-intensity conflict and institutional neglect that steadily hollows out the Jumma cultural and territorial base. The failure to implement the 1997 Peace Accord is not merely an administrative oversight; it is the deliberate maintenance of the structural conditions that facilitate dispossession.
For the international community, recognition of the CHT crisis as a process of slow-motion ethnic cleansing is crucial. Future policy recommendations must pivot away from standard development aid models and focus instead on restoring the sovereignty of the Jumma Peoples over their customary laws, ensuring the full demilitarisation of the CHT, and empowering the LDRC with the political and institutional backing required to reverse illegal land transfers committed since 1979. Without decisive international pressure and a genuine shift in Dhaka’s internal colonial policies, the irreversible erasure of the Jumma identity from the landscape of the Chittagong Hill Tracts appears increasingly inevitable.
References (Illustrative)
Amnesty International. (2013). Bangladesh: Indigenous Peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts still face abuses and land grabbing. London: Amnesty International Publications.
Chakma, C. (2019). The CHT Accord and the Question of Accountability: Militarisation and Human Rights Abuses in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. The Oxford Monitor of Forced Migration, 9(1), 38–45.
CHT Commission. (2017). Land Rights and Militarization in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Dhaka/Amsterdam: CHT Commission Report.
Mohsin, A. (2003). The Politics of Nationalism in Bangladesh: The CHT and the Land Question. Dhaka: University Press Limited.
Shelley, M. R. (Ed.). (1992). The Second Decade of the CHT Crisis: A Review of the Situation. Dhaka: CHT Commission.
Survival International. (2020). Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts: The Hidden Conflict. [Online resource].
United Nations Security Council (UNSC). (1992). Report of the Commission of Experts Established Pursuant to Security Council Resolution 780 (1992). (S/25274).
van Schendel, W. (2002). The Invention of the ‘Jummas’: State Policy and Ethnic Relations in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Modern Asian Studies, 36(1), 91–120.
