View: India must not give in to pressure, Rohingyas must be deported
TOI Contributor|
Updated: Oct 03, 2017, 11.54 AM IST
By Sushant Sareen
The decision to deport illegal Rohingya migrants has acted as a catalyst for the unlikely, and yet natural, alliance between Islamists, communists and pseudo-liberals to come together and launch a disingenuous campaign. Broadly, India’s Rohingya problem needs to be viewed from three or four angles – legal, security, strategic and humanitarian.
Legally, the stand taken by the government is unexceptionable. The vast majority of the Rohingya in India are illegal immigrants and as such cannot claim any legal right under the Indian constitution to not be deported to their home country. But while the principle of deportation of illegal immigrants cannot be questioned, the practicality of deportation is quite another matter.
Clearly, given the logistics of deporting the tens of thousands of illegal Rohingya migrants, coupled with the fact that Myanmar would be loath to accepting them back, the entire deportation process will be extremely complicated. Even so, the practical problems of deportation cannot and should not be conflated with the principle of deportation.
Simply put, it is the right of every country to deport illegal immigrants. There are innumerable examples of countries that preach to India to refrain from deporting the Rohingya, but actually deport tens of thousands of illegal immigrants from their countries.
Even more galling is the fact that many of the countries who pontificate that deportation is unconscionable because it means pushing these people in harm’s way, are quite blasé about the fate of those whom they deport from their countries. For instance, Hazara Shias from Pakistan have been fleeing massacres by Sunni terror groups (many of them supported by the Pakistani ‘deep state’) by the droves but find the doors of most countries closed to them.
The government’s apprehension that the Rohingya constitute a clear and present danger to national security cannot be brushed aside as cavalierly as is being done by the unholy trinity of Islamists, communists and pseudo-liberals. For one, the Indian government has no failsafe mechanism for vetting the people who have entered India, much less keeping tabs on those who will spread into different parts of India if they are permitted to stay.
Given the organic links between the Rohingya and jihadist terror groups in Pakistan that go back a few decades, allowing the Rohingya a run of the place in India will constitute a serious threat to national security. Many Rohingya were part of the ‘jihad’ against the erstwhile Soviet Union in Afghanistan and later participated in jihadist action in Kashmir.
A large number of them also went back to Bangladesh and formed the nucleus of the jihadist organisations that struck roots in Bangladesh during the regime of General Ershad and later Begum Khaleda Zia. Using Bangladesh as a base, they established links with Indian jihadists and also carried out actions inside Myanmar.
Even today, jihadist Rohingya groups have a clear link with Pakistan – the chief of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army was born in Karachi and has close links with Pakistani jihadist groups and indeed Pakistani intelligence agencies. Recent intelligence has only corroborated these links and even indicated that the terror attacks inside Myanmar were orchestrated by ISI and Pakistani jihadist groups.
If news reportage from some refugee camps is anything to go by, many of the so-called Rohingya refugees are actually members of jihadist groups who have in fact been involved in massacres of Hindu Rohingya in Myanmar. And yet, India is expected to open its doors for these despicable characters.
An even bigger danger is of the Rohingya who have illegally entered India. They are extremely susceptible and even receptive to radical ideology, and there are already reports of radical preachers making a beeline for recruiting these people to make them jihadist cannon fodder.
Surely, only a government utterly negligent of security of Indian citizens will turn a blind eye to this problem. From a strategic viewpoint, India needs to deal with Myanmar. It is a pivotal country in India’s Act East policy and India cannot afford to abandon Myanmar and leave the field open for China.
Incidentally, the Chinese have backed the Myanmar government completely on the Rohingya issue. For India the problem is that we have to balance our close relationship with Bangladesh, which is bearing the brunt of the refugee crisis, with our relationship with Myanmar.
In any case, unless India engages Myanmar, it will not have any leverage to seek any resolution to the problem. The bottom line is that sometimes the exigencies of strategic interest outweigh certain moral dilemmas, and for this India doesn’t need to be apologetic.
While there is no denying the humanitarian crisis caused by the disturbances in Myanmar, the solution to the crisis doesn’t lie in opening India’s doors to the Rohingya. The solution lies in creating conditions so that these people can go back to where they came from.
But until that happens, India is trying to give whatever assistance it can to a friendly country like Bangladesh to cope with the refugee burden. What India cannot afford to do is to fall for the false and self-serving narrative about its image, democratic credentials, traditions and so on, and open the floodgates to refugees.
The writer is Senior Fellow, Vivekananda International Foundation
The decision to deport illegal Rohingya migrants has acted as a catalyst for the unlikely, and yet natural, alliance between Islamists, communists and pseudo-liberals to come together and launch a disingenuous campaign. Broadly, India’s Rohingya problem needs to be viewed from three or four angles – legal, security, strategic and humanitarian.
Legally, the stand taken by the government is unexceptionable. The vast majority of the Rohingya in India are illegal immigrants and as such cannot claim any legal right under the Indian constitution to not be deported to their home country. But while the principle of deportation of illegal immigrants cannot be questioned, the practicality of deportation is quite another matter.
Clearly, given the logistics of deporting the tens of thousands of illegal Rohingya migrants, coupled with the fact that Myanmar would be loath to accepting them back, the entire deportation process will be extremely complicated. Even so, the practical problems of deportation cannot and should not be conflated with the principle of deportation.
Simply put, it is the right of every country to deport illegal immigrants. There are innumerable examples of countries that preach to India to refrain from deporting the Rohingya, but actually deport tens of thousands of illegal immigrants from their countries.
Even more galling is the fact that many of the countries who pontificate that deportation is unconscionable because it means pushing these people in harm’s way, are quite blasé about the fate of those whom they deport from their countries. For instance, Hazara Shias from Pakistan have been fleeing massacres by Sunni terror groups (many of them supported by the Pakistani ‘deep state’) by the droves but find the doors of most countries closed to them.
The government’s apprehension that the Rohingya constitute a clear and present danger to national security cannot be brushed aside as cavalierly as is being done by the unholy trinity of Islamists, communists and pseudo-liberals. For one, the Indian government has no failsafe mechanism for vetting the people who have entered India, much less keeping tabs on those who will spread into different parts of India if they are permitted to stay.
Given the organic links between the Rohingya and jihadist terror groups in Pakistan that go back a few decades, allowing the Rohingya a run of the place in India will constitute a serious threat to national security. Many Rohingya were part of the ‘jihad’ against the erstwhile Soviet Union in Afghanistan and later participated in jihadist action in Kashmir.
A large number of them also went back to Bangladesh and formed the nucleus of the jihadist organisations that struck roots in Bangladesh during the regime of General Ershad and later Begum Khaleda Zia. Using Bangladesh as a base, they established links with Indian jihadists and also carried out actions inside Myanmar.
Even today, jihadist Rohingya groups have a clear link with Pakistan – the chief of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army was born in Karachi and has close links with Pakistani jihadist groups and indeed Pakistani intelligence agencies. Recent intelligence has only corroborated these links and even indicated that the terror attacks inside Myanmar were orchestrated by ISI and Pakistani jihadist groups.
If news reportage from some refugee camps is anything to go by, many of the so-called Rohingya refugees are actually members of jihadist groups who have in fact been involved in massacres of Hindu Rohingya in Myanmar. And yet, India is expected to open its doors for these despicable characters.
An even bigger danger is of the Rohingya who have illegally entered India. They are extremely susceptible and even receptive to radical ideology, and there are already reports of radical preachers making a beeline for recruiting these people to make them jihadist cannon fodder.
Surely, only a government utterly negligent of security of Indian citizens will turn a blind eye to this problem. From a strategic viewpoint, India needs to deal with Myanmar. It is a pivotal country in India’s Act East policy and India cannot afford to abandon Myanmar and leave the field open for China.
Incidentally, the Chinese have backed the Myanmar government completely on the Rohingya issue. For India the problem is that we have to balance our close relationship with Bangladesh, which is bearing the brunt of the refugee crisis, with our relationship with Myanmar.
In any case, unless India engages Myanmar, it will not have any leverage to seek any resolution to the problem. The bottom line is that sometimes the exigencies of strategic interest outweigh certain moral dilemmas, and for this India doesn’t need to be apologetic.
While there is no denying the humanitarian crisis caused by the disturbances in Myanmar, the solution to the crisis doesn’t lie in opening India’s doors to the Rohingya. The solution lies in creating conditions so that these people can go back to where they came from.
But until that happens, India is trying to give whatever assistance it can to a friendly country like Bangladesh to cope with the refugee burden. What India cannot afford to do is to fall for the false and self-serving narrative about its image, democratic credentials, traditions and so on, and open the floodgates to refugees.
The writer is Senior Fellow, Vivekananda International Foundation
