mithun chakma

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KALPANA CHAKMA WILL NEVER DIE: MAKE THE INQUIRY REPORT
PUBLIC
By Mithun Chakma, General Secretary, Democratic Youth
Forum


FLASH BACK
On the night of 11 June, 1996. Scene: New Lalyaghona
village, Marishya, Rangamati. Barely 7/8 hours were to
go before the voting for the seventh National
Parliamentary Elections began. Earlier in the day
Kalpana Chakma had taken part in exhaustive election
campaign for her candidate. She felt tired and soon
dipped into a deep sleep. What was she dreaming in her
sleep? A dream dreamt by each and every Jumma? A
sudden, shrill and harsh voice made her awoke: "Who
are in the house? Come out." In pure Bangla the voice
spoke. It was past midnight, about 1.30 a.m. to be
exact. The sounds of the boots of the soldiers were
tearing the stillness of the night apart.

Mrs. Bandhuni Chakma, Kalpana Chakma's widowed mother,
got out of the bed and opened the door, her whole body
trembling in fear. Then one by one came out: Kalpana
Chakma, her two brothers, Khudhiram and Kalindi Kumar,
and Kalindi Kumar's wife. The house was surrounded by
the marauding soldiers so that no one could escape. A
soldier flashed a torch on their faces and Kalindi
Kumar recognized Lt. Ferdous, who had visited their
house a few days back, and two VDP (Village Defence
Party) members - Nurul Haqe and Salah Ahmed. Amnesty
International in an Urgent Action issued on 1st July
wrote: "Six or seven security personnel in
plainclothes, believed to be from Ugalchari army camp
(actually Lieut. Ferdous was commander of Kojoichari
Army camp), are reported to have entered the home of
Kalpana Chakma in New Lallyaghona village, Rangamati
district in the early hours of 12 June. Kalpana Chakma
and two of her brothers were forcibly taken from their
home, blindfolded and with their hands tied."

What happened after that? Members of the Ain -o-
Salish Kendra (ASK), a Bangladeshi human rights
organisation, visited the place of occurrence after
the incident. In their report they said, “They (army)
took Khudiram near a lake and told him to step into
the lake. As soon as he went down in the lake, there
was an order to fire bullet on him. Out of fear
Khudiram took shelter in the water and with a fearful
swimming of some minutes he managed to take shelter in
the house of one neighbour called Lamba, but without
clothes in his body. The armed personnel fired at him
but he managed to flee without being hurt. In the
meantime the armed personnel took Kalpana Chakma and
her brother Kalindi Kumar blindfolded. After hearing
the firing he (Kalindi Kumar) tried to run to flee
from them, and he managed. When he was fleeing he
heard two firings and heard that his sister Kalpana
Chakma was screaming.”  In an interview Kalicharan
(Kalindi Kumar) said “They shot at me and when I ran I
could hear Kalpana crying out ‘Dah Dah Mare Baja"
(Brother, brother save me!).

Dear readers, please don't mistake it for a
Shakespearean tragedy. It's real life in Chittagong
Hill Tracts.

WHY WAS SHE ABDUCTED?
Kalpana Chakma is a combination of an indigenous
political activist, a women leader and a human rights
defender. She was the organising secretary of the Hill
Women's Federation, a platform for the Jumma women in
Chittagong Hill Tracts. She is an excellent organiser
and played a very important role in organising its
first central conference in Khagrachari in 1995. The
Daily Star reporter Morshed Ali Khan, who visited
Kalpana Chakma's house after the incident, wrote:
‘Local youth said that Kalpana, a student of BA at the
local college, was always a strong and vocal activist
for the cause of the Chakma people and she regularly
attended conferences, discussions at the national
level and played a prominent role in this respect’.
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 http://www.newagebd.com/2005/dec/03/fb.html

CHT accord and ground reality

Eight years have passed since the signing of the Chittagong Hill Tracts peace accord. Still there is no peace or a real solution in the CHT. The CHT accord was signed on 2 December 1997 in Dhaka between the then Awami League government and the JSS or Jana Samhati Samiti. In the accord there are many exalted words and phrases, but the reality is it has no implementing capability attached to it because of the complex administrative formation in CHT. As Sakhawat Hossain, a security expert, recently said at a meeting, the ‘signing of the treaty was nothing but doing some formalities. It should have been signed after more study and discussion’ (ref New Age, 30 November, 2005). We also think that the CHT accord was signed so quickly that those who did it did not even think about the implementation problems involved.
   At present, in the CHT there are more than six administrative units running parallel. These are:
   (1) The District Commissioner (DC) running the central administration.
   (2) The CHT ministry affairs run by deputy minister Mani Swapan Dewan.
   (3) The CHT development board, the economical lever in the CHT, run by the chairman Wadud Bhuiyan MP.
   (4) The military also has authoritative status under ‘Operation Uttaran’.
   (5) The CHT regional and district councils also exercise power.
   (6) The three chiefs of the Chakma, Bhomang and the Mong tribes also have some powers.
   (7) The elected parliament member or MP exercises some powers on his own.
   The problem with these authorities is that there are no uniform rules or regulations to oversee their functions. Now the fate of the CHT accord is at stake. Unless the CHT administrative authority is uniformly formed there will be problems in implementing the CHT accord.
   The other thing is the Jumma people in the CHT do not think that the CHT accord fulfilled all their demands. So they are now under the leadership of the United People’s Democratic Front (UPDF), a political party based in the CHT and demanding full autonomy for the ethnic group. Full autonomy means, the Jumma people will have control over all matters relating to the welfare of the Jumma people. We hope the government’s attitude towards the CHT people will be friendly.
   Mithun Chakma
   Dhaka

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 http://www.newagebd.com/2006/jan/21/fb.html

Abductor still in military

About 10 years ago a military officer Lieut. Ferdous infamously got media attention as an abductor.
   This military officer abducted an ethnic hill woman leader named Kalpana Chakma. She was Organisational Secretary of Hill Women's Federation (HWF), a women’s organisation based in Chittagong Hill Tracts(CHT).
   Lieut Ferdous abducted Kalpana from her house in the remote village Lailyaghona under Baghaichari Thana in Rangamati district on 12 June 1996.
   At that time he was a lieutenant. The abduction news got media attention and the then AL government had formed an inquiry committee. Though the committee submitted the result but up until now the Govt. did not publish it in the media. As a result, Kalpana still remains untraced. We are in total darkness as to her whereabouts.
   But the accused military officer Lieut. Ferdous is still serving in Bangladesh Military.
   We have come to know that at present he is a full-fledged Major in charge of Laxmichari camp at Baghaichari Thana in Rangamati district (ref.
   Swadhikar news bulletin no.36, UPDF's mouthpiece). We ask: Why the military authorities did not suspend him and give him punishment? Why he was given promotion? He has been accused of abduction and he must be handed over to the law enforcing authorities.
   But, instead of doing that, the authorities promoted him to the rank of a Major!
   Now the question is: should law be different for the helpless? Is it different for the ethnic Jumma peoples who have no constitutional recognition? Can the military authorities impose semi-military rule under the 'operation Uttaran'? We have many more questions like this? And we want answers.
   Mithun Chakma
   Secretary, Democratic Youth Forum (DYF A progressive Youth Organisation Based in Chittagong)

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11th year of Kalpana Chakma’s abduction
Perpetrators must be brought to justice

Kalpana Chakma- has become a source of courage and inspiration in the struggle of Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT).

As we all know, she was abducted by Lieutenant Ferdous, the then Kojoichari camp commander, under Baghaichari thana in Rangamati district on the night of 11 June 1996, just seven hours before the voting began for national parliamentary elections.

The incident attracted national and international attention. The Jumma people of CHT launched massive agitation against the incident. Peoples from all walks of life joined the movement and in the plainland of the country progressive and conscientious citizens voiced their unequivocal support for the demand that the abductors be punished with due severity. Eleven years have already passed, yet the perpetrators have been brought to justice. Lieutenant Ferdous, the main culprit, is still serving in the military and he is reported to have been promoted to the higher rank and posted back to a camp not far from Kojoichari, his earlier posting.  This is strange! Such kind of things can only happen in Bangladesh!! (More)

A brief profile of M. N. Larma

(a leader of CHT people’s struggle)

Manabendra Narayan Larma was the main initiator of the Jumma nationalist movement in Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT). In the 1960s, when a pettite bourgeois educated class emerged in CHT it made an attempt to unite the people of different nationalities of the CHT into one single nation. They invented ‘Jumma Nationalism’ to this end. Mr. M. N. Larma played a vanguard role in this nationalist movement. He was also one of the main architects of the armed struggle that was directed against the deprivation and oppression unleashed by the then Government of Bangladesh. He led the struggle from 1975, until his death in a factional clash in 1983. The CHT people still remember him with due honour and respect.

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Bekkunore Zoo Zu janangar.

 

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