The INDIGENOUS PEOPLE OF BANGLADESH
The Human Rights issues with the indigenous people in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) of Bangladesh have been salient since the late 1970s, and have existed until the present time. Here, many human rights groups have become involved in these issues, with the central aim of alleviating human rights abuse.
The human rights groups have organized countless talks over the years, at local, regional and international events, and for example, on issues of the Chakma people. These talks have addressed the crisis and futures of the Chakma people in Bangladesh, and beyond, and the ways in which the Bangladeshi government can deal with both their problems and their language heritage.
Yet, a range of restructions have impeded activism, or at the very least, a discussion on the human rights of these groups, as governments and other groups frequently crack down on activists, and act to silence the activists in ways. The restrictions that impede activism thus limit groups from working towards the liberation of these people, at times when human rights are abused.
Groups other than the Chakma in the Chittagong Hill Tract, as a region of 11 multilingual indigenous peoples, include the Marma, Tripura, Mro, Bawm, Pangkhu, Khyang, Khumi, Chak, Lushai and Tanchangya groups, in addition to a small number of descendents of Assames, Gorkha and Santals.
The groups throughout the Chittagong Hill Tract are all collectively labelled as the Jumma (High Landers). Yet, we can differentiate between these groups and the Bengali people of Bangladesh.
As such, the Chittagong Hill Tract has been divided into three hill districts. These three districts are the Rangamati, the Khagrachari and the Bandarban hill districts. The CHT legal and administrative system is articulately separate from those throughout other parts of Bangladesh.
A decentralised government institution also exists in the Chittagong Hill Tract, where at regional level, this appears pervasively. The Chittagong Hill Tracts also contain traditional structures predicated on the customs of the local indigenous Jumma people, which have Circle Chiefs, and Headmen at Mouza and Karbaries, mostly at the village category.