Rohingya

Rohingya are an ethnic group, largely comprising Muslims, who predominantly live in the Western Myanmar province of Rakhine. They speak a dialect of Bengali, as opposed to the commonly spoken Burmese language.
Though they have been living in the country for generations, Myanmar considers them as persons who migrated to their land during the Colonial rule. So, it has not granted Rohingyas full citizenship.
Since they are not citizens, their movements are restricted within the Rakhine state.

2017 attack

In 2017, the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA), a Rohingya insurgent group, attacked police posts and an army base in Rakhine state.
The response by the Myanmar security forces has sent over 7,00,000 Rohingyas fleeing into Bangladesh and other neighbouring countries including India. Reports of villages being torched and civilian deaths have followed the militant attack.
The UN termed the Rohingya’s situation as the “world’s fastest growing refugee crisis”.

India’s stand

According to the Ministry of Home Affairs, there are approximately 40,000 Rohingyas living in India. They have reached India from Bangladesh through the land route over the years.
The government had previously informed that all the Rohingyas in India were “illegal immigrants” and they will be deported soon.

Legal provisions

India doesn’t have a specific law regarding refugees.
India is not a signatory of the 1951 UN Convention or the 1967 Protocol – both relating to the Status of Refugees and included in the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) statute.
However, UNHCR had earlier stated that the ‘principle of non-refoulement’ is considered part of customary international law and therefore binding on all states whether they have signed the Refugee Convention or not.
In addition, India is party to major international human rights instruments such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and Convention on the Rights of the Child.

A foreigner is considered to be an illegal immigrant under two circumstances.
- One, if they come into India without valid travel documents, or
- two, having come in legally, they stay beyond the time period permitted to them under their travel documents.

Non-refoulement is a principle in international law that stops a country from returning a person to a place where they would be at risk of persecution.

Anti-junta protesters flooded Myanmar’s social media with pictures of themselves wearing black in a show of solidarity for the Rohingya.
Since the military ousted civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi from power in a February 1 coup, an anti-junta movement demanding a return to democracy has grown to include fighting for ethnic minority rights.

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