13 Years Later 30,000 Head For Home in Mizoram

By Samudra Gupta Kashyap

Away from the national spotlight, over 30,000 Bru tribals who have been staying in temporary camps in Kanchanpur in Tripura for 13 long years have finally begun their journey back home.

Uprooted from their homes due to a communal riot, they are returning to the three Mizoram districts they belong to in batches. The first batch of 53 families returned on November 3 and has started settling down while the second batch of 48 families left on Saturday.

“It is definitely a very significant thing happening to a small community that once led a happy, colourful life. It may not seem very striking to people outside Mizoram, Tripura or for that matter outside the Northeast. But that our people are heading back to where they originally belong is itself a positive thing,” said Elvis Chorkhey, general secretary of the Bru Coordination Committee (BCC), the apex body of the Bru community in Mizoram.

The displaced people hail from Mamit, Lunglei and Kolasib in Mizoram. They had to take refuge in the adjoining Kanchanpur sub-division of north Tripura in the backdrop of major ethnic violence between them and the Mizos in 1997 which claimed about 10 lives and witnessed large-scale arson. The Brus (also known as Reangs) are demanding, among other things, an autonomous council within Mizoram as the Chakma, Lai and Mara tribes already have, and recognition of their language.

While efforts to shift them back to Mizoram have continued, it is only in the past two years that a proper repatriation and rehabilitation package was finally worked out and agreed upon by the community, with the Mizoram government also agreeing to get them back.

Still, the process was stuck till Union Home Minister P Chidambaram visited the state in May this year.

While 231 displaced Bru families consisting of 1,115 persons returned to Mizoram between May 21 and 26 this year immediately after Chidambaram’s visit, the process again got stuck when the refugees suddenly raised a new demand that they be sent back to one district and not to the three where they originally came from.

“We are expecting to wind up the entire process of bringing back the 5,000-odd families in a phased manner hopefully by Christmas, or at the most by February next year,” David H Lalthanliana, officer on special duty in the Mizoram Home Department, told The Indian Express over the telephone.

Under the package that has been worked out, each family would be provided Rs 80,000, including cost of housing material for building new homes as well as a cash component. The package also includes free ration for one year and establishment of schools, hospitals and other amenities for the community. This apart, a special development package has also been promised once all the people have returned.

A section of leaders from within the refugees has also demanded that the Mizoram government allot them at least two Assembly constituencies. However, the Mizoram government has made it clear that it would only implement in letter and spirit the guidelines laid down by the Union government.

A group of leaders like Bruno Msha and A Sawibung, who are opposed to the repatriation process, further wants a four-cornered negotiation involving the Mizoram Bru Displaced People’s Forum (MBDPF), the Centre and the state governments of Mizoram and Tripura, so that a memorandum of understanding could be signed incorporating a series of their demands.

On Wednesday, those opposed to the repatriation put up a road blockade, preventing Mizoram officials from going to Kanchanpur to move out the second batch. On Friday, clashes broke out between the pro- and anti-repatriation leaders in Kanchanpur when the latter tried to prevent a joint team of Mizoram and Tripura officials on their way to identify the families who were willing to be part of the second batch.

The Centre has been providing the refugees 600 grams of rice per day for each adult and 300 grams for each minor. There is also a “cash allowance”, of Rs 5 and Rs 2.50 per day, respectively. “But the lack of healthcare support and educational facilities and the dangerously poor hygienic conditions have already cost the families dear,” said Chorkhey.

At least 12,000 of the refugees living in camps in Narsingpara and Ashapara in Kanchanpur till recently were children, with both infant mortality and maternal mortality being high. Hoping their lives would finally change, a majority of the people say they want to get back as early as possible. “Thirteen years is too long a time to spend in refugee camps. Life there can never be normal under any circumstances,” added Chorkhey.