Myanmar Communal Violence- a Set back to Democratic Process
Ram Puniyani
Most of the countries of
South Asia have faced the barbaric problem of violence targeted against
religious minorities. The form of this may have been different, but the outcome
has been similar, the brutality against religious minorities, violence against
innocent human beings. The current times (Mid 2013) may be one of the worst
when in the spate of short span of we are witness to violence in Pakistan,
Bangla Desh, India and Myanmar, more or less running parallel. Many a times
when talk about violence involving Muslims has been under discussion, some
propagandists have tried to associate Islam with violence and so the strife. Similarly
some others may say that Hinduism permits violence as in Gita or so and so is the
problem. In popular perception Buddhism is the religion of peace. The truth is
that while the religious precepts are for morality, the part of religion invoked
for violence has more to do with contemporary political issues, which are given
the garb of religion. While Lord Gautama Buddha is surely the major apostle of
peace, one has seen violence by Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka, Thailand and now
overtly in Myanmar (March 2013).
Troops are keeping a vigil,
martial law has been declared to stop the communal rage which has lasted for
three days in Meikhatila in Myanmar. This violence has involved the Buddhists
and Muslims. Here the official toll
stands at 31 dead, while the unofficial figures are higher. A state of emergency has been declared in
this state. As usual a trivial incident involving the argument between the
Buddhist couple and a Muslim owner of gold shop resulted in the triggering of
simmering dislikes and discord between these two communities resulting in
violence. While one Buddhist monk has also been killed the major victims of the
violence are Muslims. This bring to our memory the communal clash of June -July (2012) in Rakhine State in western
Myanmar. In that violence officially 110 people were killed and it left 120,000
people homeless. Those killed and left homeless were mostly stateless Rohingya
Muslims.
Interestingly
the communal strife was under the wraps during the preceding dictatorial
regime. With the efforts to bring in democracy in some form these strife’s are
coming to surface due to the diverse and plural nature of Myanmar society,
which is majority Buddhist but has substantial number of Muslim minorities. Rohingiya
Muslims are probably the most persecuted minority in the world. Being a
substantial number in Myanmar, they are from Indo-Aryan group, who settled in
this part over a period of last couple of centuries, during the British rule,
primarily. While the majority Buddhists are of Sino-Tibetan stock. Muslims live in the Western state of Rakhine state
on country’s Western border. They have
been adversely affected by the 1982 citizenship law, which has deprived them of
the citizenship; there is a total violation of their human rights due to this
unjust law. They are subjected to forced labour and have to work for the Government
without any pay. The UNHCR has noted
that since 1991 their freedom of movement is restricted. They are treated like
second class citizens. Facing this adverse situation of gross violation of
their rights many of them are trying to flee to Thailand, Malaysia and other
places amongst others.
In
2012, June-July the violence between Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims was
triggered by the rumour of rape of a Buddhist girl. As such it was a case of
Muslim boy and Buddhist girl falling in love and eloping to get married. The
boy was murdered and two of his friends who helped him to elope are facing
death sentence.
Overall
this reflects the unsolved problem of secularization and democracy in the
region. The common factor in whole of South Asia is the migration of people for
economic reasons, and with independence coming many of the dominating
communities wanted to associate citizenship rights based on religion. Due to
this some communities got deprived of citizenship formally or informally. Some
were relegated to second class citizenship in practice. In Sri Lanka, the large
number of Tamils who had gone there as plantation labour was denied equal
rights and denied equality leading the extreme reaction in the form of
formation of Liberation Tiger of Tamil Elam (LTTE).
In
Myanmar 5% of the people are Muslims. Many of them had been the residents of
this region from centuries. Denying them full citizenship defies all the logic
of a modern democratic state. During the regime of military junta, which ruled
the country for decades, a wrong precedent has been set, that of linking
citizenship with religion. It requires deeper investigation as to why many a
monks have an anti Islamic attitude. One knows similarly many a monks had
played anti-Tamil role in Sri Lanka. There must be deeper societal processes
which are at work and are usurping the democratic norms of equality of religions.
One knows that democracy is coming up in Myanmar after long decades after long
battles, but still the remnants of the communal divide are dogging this nascent
democracy. In a way this is also the colonial legacy which subtly promoted the
divisiveness in the society.
With
this violence in Myanmar coming to the fore the whole South Asia has to wake up
and come to the grips of the legacy of the colonial past, a legacy perpetuated
due to economic and political policies of rulers, rulers who have in a
short-sighted manner resorted to abuse of religious identity for their
political goals. Some political tendencies have thrived on the identity of religions
and spread the ‘Hate’ about ‘other’ community. It is retarding the process of
development in each of South Asian countries and also putting strong brakes on
the same. South Asia should have been striving towards the process of formation
of South Asian Federation, which can expedite the processes leading to peace in
the sub continent. Regional peace in turn is a prerequisite for development of
the regions. We need to look beyond the narrow religious identities and promote
the freedom of religion, equality of religions and dignity and honour for
people of all the faiths for a better environment in those countries and a more
congenial atmosphere for enhancement of human rights of weaker sections of
society.