Posted on 24 June 2008 by Incidental Blogger
CHT: Beyond Narratives
Several blog posts have been written in the recent months since the Sajek incident in CHT (Chittagong Hill Tracts) followed by two well-publicised fact finding reports. These reports also brought the Kalpana Chakma campaign in the forefront, once again, reviving her cause in the public domain. While activists are mobilising, organising, speaking for justice, the establishment decided to strike again. This week, five more activists including Alakesh Chakma and Ani Bikash Chakma have been picked up by “plain clothes” security personnel. No charges have been filed; no right to an attorney; no one even knows where they have been taken. They simply disappeared. [Update: according to one unverified report, they have been released after three days of detention in an undisclosed location].
Going through the reports gave me a strange feeling. They reminded me of similar arson attacks, similar disappearances - that have taken place before. Nothing seem to have changed. Same opposing groups, same patterns of prejudice, same abuses, same cover ups. Everything is same except the year stamps. Twelve years ago it was Kalpana Chakma’s disappearance, this year it is Alakesh and Ani. Twelve years ago, the arson attacks took place near New Lalyaghona (Kalpana’s home village); this year, it is in Sajek. Twelve years ago, in that fateful month of madness prior to the national election, 38 people disappeared from Baghaichari including Kalpana; this year the number is rising with promises for more incidents like this in the coming months. As if a video scene is being replayed by someone. Even the official versions and the contrasting human rights narratives sound like distant echoes. They remind us of the outrage, still alive in our memory; they remind us of the sense of helplessness, still raw in our soul. After the noise and roars silence creeps, and in the still air I keep hearing the whisper: “impunity perpetuates injustice, . . . impunity . . . ”