Rohingyas in camps and the politics of votebank

And we are here as on a darkling plain / Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,/ Where ignorant armies clash by night. —Matthew Arnold, Dover Beach

The preceding lines are even more telling. The poet despairs that a world that ought to have been a "land of dreams" has "neither joy, nor love, nor light,/Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain."

This is true about any place in the world today where the authoritarian regimes' playbook has stripped language of all verity and normalised fear.

But let us look in the back lanes of our capital, Delhi, that is now governed by the BJP and a parallel LG office of the same hue. Both the power centres are competing hard to please the masters in polarising the political vocabulary by identifying the 'other'. What better alibi than the Rohingya to turn to?

Even the initial 'outrage', if any, has dissipated over the persistent state of harassment on Rohingya refugees living in Delhi's Madanpur Khadar, Shram Vihar, Khajoori Khas and Vikaspuri.

Soon after the formation of the new government and following Union Home Minister's review of Delhi's security calling out Rohingyas and Bangladeshis as a threat to national security, on February 24, a large number of police vehicles arrived in Madanpur to round up women, children and the elderly.

The Rohingyas have been living on the edge for years, but this time, the fear and intimidation brought back memories of the genocide back home.

They were taken to police stations for biometric verification and threatened to not resume any work or face deportation. In the continuing crackdown, some have reportedly been forced to sign documents in languages they don't understand. Many have been taken to undisclosed locations without legal representation. It is safe to conclude that the actions of the authorities violate international human rights.

The last time I visited the Madanpur camp, there were approximately 36 Rohingya families living in extremely poor conditions. The other families have moved to rented accommodation, though now there is pressure on their landowners to vacate them.

Despite possessing valid UNHCR cards that give them refugee status, their settlements have been repeatedly attacked, gutted and demolished. They have no access to any sanitation facilities and their power connection is often suspended.

They are denied Aadhaar cards or access to formal work or even the right to give birth in government hospitals. If they manage to access healthcare, they are denied birth certificates. It is a story of absolute dispossession.

The recent police crackdown is robbing them of their last spot of hope. They have been cautioned not to venture from the makeshift homes, saying that surprise checks will be carried out.

Coinciding with Ramadan, this renewed operation of surveillance and intimidation has taken away any remaining agency. The students need to continue their education and the families must step out to earn and get food on the table.

Fleeing from genocide in Myanmar, they are faced with a harsher fate of being hunted down as 'illegals'. Even the feeble reportage on media has faded, the civil society that once uttered a few sentences are invisible and the political elite on either side wants them as trophies of 'othering'. The UNCHR has virtually given up on them. The judiciary is looking the other way and the executive is taking orders.

We are no longer bewildered because of the normalisation of the regime's draconian actions that are now upon citizens. Who will mourn the refugees! Detention and deportation may have assumed fresh meanings with images of chained Indian deportees and students being sent back by the purveyors of the "new world".

India is already home to several detention centres housing asylum seekers, refugees and migrants abetted by the Foreigners Act 1946, part of a set of archaic laws that regulates immigration in India. There are no detention time limits in India, leaving detainees subject to indefinite detention.

As per the UNHCR 2024 data, 676 Rohingya refugees are in detention centres across India, with more than half being women and children. These holding areas are jail-like facilities where Rohingya people are cut off from outside interactions and legal aid. These detentions exist in Delhi, Jammu, Hyderabad, West Bengal and Assam. They are also detained in Bangalore, Kochi, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. The Matia Transit Camp in Assam is the country's largest detention centre, where around 103 Rohingya women, children and men are detained along with another 171 detainees who are Bangladeshis or Indians declared as foreigners. Delhi has two such centres.

The level of political and executive engagement around Rohingyas has been absurd. In 2023, the police in Jammu accompanied a Rohingya couple who lost their 40-day-old infant in the detention centre and the couple was made to watch the burial with handcuffs!

It is hardly surprising that the Rohingya is a soft Muslim target for the right wing government. But the visceral hatred may also serve as a strategic tool to consolidate its vote bank, thereby establishing the relationship between political ideology and refugee policies. The 'other' or the 'outsider' shall not be allowed to take your land or job. A very Trumpian and far-right rhetoric heard across continents today. Hate speeches against Rohingyas account for a significant percentage.

Even the previous Delhi government did nothing to support their cause and the opposition to the ruling BJP has not cared to raise this issue. This is directly connected to the Modi government's CAA, which provoked mass protests and excludes Muslim migrants from obtaining Indian citizenship.

This could have been a point of departure for the opposition to challenge the prejudices of the ruling party by forcing the release of refugees, stop deporting them against international laws and contain hate against a people fleeing genocide.

If the Congress in yesteryear was accused of consolidating the Muslim vote bank, the BJP today has gained deep roots into the anti-Muslim consolidation and the Rohingya is the cheapest collateral.