Marmas resent BGB takeover of burning ground

The people of Roangchharhi are up against Bangladesh Border Guards taking over their land in violation of local laws.

Bandarban District Administration recently gave the BGB permission to set up its sector headquarter on 34 acres in Roangchharhi, which includes a Marma cremation site and agriculture fields.

Roangchharhi, 25 kilometers from Bandarban, is inhabited by Marma and Boam communities.

The government does not hold any land in the hills according to a 1900 law and Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Treaty, said Headman of Hlapaikkhing Mouja, Naume Pru.

“Since the natives’ own laws are in effect here, the government needs to speak to the local king or the headman before requisition of land. But neither the BGB nor the district administration held any such talks,” he said.

Some 300 families make their living by cultivating on this land, said Pru. “There is also a cremation site for Marmas here. The dead from a different tribe cannot be cremated on a ground that belongs to another tribe.”

The BGB has set up a makeshift camp with barbwire fences enclosing the entire area, a recent visit showed.

Some 30 jawans were stationed inside, and civilians were barred from entering.

Marma men and women who have crops growing inside what is now the BGB’s camp, were crowded near the fence.

Almost 250 of them stood there in an effort to access their crops, but the BGB men turned them away.

Klaikhhangparha is the village next to the fenced land.

Mang Kang Ching Marma, a retired government official who lives there, said: “Our burning ground is on that land. The place is almost a hundred years old. In our culture, it is ominous to cremate the dead of one village in the ground of another.”

Bandarban Government College student Uke Ching Marma, said: “It is time for us to reap our harvest. But we are not being allowed to enter our land for the past one month.”

Reporters caught a glimpse of the land when they were allowed to enter the BGB camp the day the local men and women were told to go away.

Eight to 10 minutes walk from the BGB camp, a patch of land sported a signboard reading ‘Klaikhhangparha Maha Swashan’.

Deputy Commissioner KS Tajul was asked why the cremation ground was given to the BGB when country’s law does not allow the requisition of land with religious establishments.

“The BGB requested the requisition of this land. The land requisition committee is working on it. There was also a recommendation from the Ministry of Home,” he said.

“I’ve seen that land myself. But I have not seen any cremation ground anywhere. It is true that the law does not allow requisition of land with religious establishments. If there is a cremation ground there we will definitely take that into consideration.”