“No freedom. Fear. Complete fear!” shouted Kan Linn, repeating the word “fear” over and over again. The 42-year-old teacher from the Sagaing region of Myanmar had been relatively quiet for an hour when his colleagues spoke about the situation in Myanmar, only occasionally nodding or shaking his head. His sudden outburst was a sign of helplessness, a common emotion that seems to have set into most refugees who fled Myanmar in the years following the onset of civil war in 2021.
The National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Aung San Suu Kyi, swept the 2020 election in Myanmar and was poised to form the government for the second time.
Hours before the newly elected government was to meet, the country’s military council (the junta) cited election irregularities and announced that it was taking over. It appointed a State Administration Council and overthrew the democratically elected government. Similar to the coup of 1962, many pro-democracy leaders, including Suu Kyi, were arrested almost immediately.
Taking on the junta
Since then, there have been widespread protests against the military regime, ranging from mass strikes to boycotts, with those opposed to the junta leading a civil disobedience movement amidst a violent crackdown, arrests, and Internet shutdowns. Within months, elected parliamentarians formed the National Unity Government (NUG), a government in exile, declaring their intention to take on the military regime. Local resistance groups emerged to support them, arming and organising themselves into battalions; they are often collectively referred to as People’s Defence Forces or Local Defence Forces.
These came up in addition to the already existing ethnic armed organisations, which are region-specific; some of them have extended support to the NUG. Many of these groups have now seized control of military outposts across Myanmar, especially those close to the borders. The junta and its militias have been vindictive in their response, routinely attacking villages they suspect are against them.
A makeshift classroom at the Kheronram refugee camp. | Photo Credit: GREESHMA KUTHAR
There have been reports of brutal violence and mass killings during such incursions. According to statistics compiled by Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma), 26,936 people have been arrested since the coup started in 2021. More than 5,000 have been killed. In February this year, the junta reintroduced a dormant law that made it compulsory for men aged 18 to 35 and women aged 18 to 27 to serve in the army for at least two years. This led to further panic, resulting in many people fleeing the country and a number of armed attacks by anti-junta forces.
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During one such standoff in early November in 2023, the Sagaing region came under attack. Almost everyone from the township and its neighbouring villages, with a mixed population of Myanmarese citizens of Bamar, Shan, and Kuki-Zo communities, fled towards the Indian border. Within hours, most of the villages were hit by air strikes.
In the weeks that followed, close to 10 villages on the India-Myanmar border were razed to the ground. During a visit to the border area of Tengnoupal in Manipur in late January, this reporter met refugees who had fled the Sagaing region to the town of Tamu on the Myanmar side of the border, facing Moreh on the Manipur side. Robinson Kamodang (66), a trader from Kheronram, a village in Manipur’s Kamjong district, told Frontline that he saw a flood of panic-stricken people from Myanmar entering his village in groups, many hysterical and in shock.
Helping the refugees
He said: “Even before the attacks, a few had begun entering my village out of fear. But when the attacks started, all of them fled their villages.”
Robinson said that he and others arranged food and water and offered reassurance to the refugees that the junta’s forces could not reach them on the Indian side. People on both sides of the border are familiar with each other since the villages are located on an important trade route. That is why the fleeing refugees did not face any hostility on the Indian side.
As their numbers swelled, however, the district authorities got involved. “We started to collect the biometrics of all refugees above the age of 5,” Rangnamei Rang Peter, the Deputy Commissioner and District Magistrate of Kamjong, told Frontline, reiterating how maintaining records of the refugees was paramount, especially since Manipur was itself in the middle of a civil war.
In the case of Kamjong, those involved in helping the refugees did not initially face any issues. The Raizen Traders Association (RTA), for instance, continues to assist the administration in providing essentials for the refugees. “We were aware of the fighting in the border villages. The refugees were in bad shape, and we helped them on humanitarian grounds in whatever way we could,” said Phareipam Shithungdang, president of the RTA.
The organisation helped the administration procure essential items and distribute them among the displaced people. It organised medical camps, and volunteers escorted those needing serious medical care to the primary health centre in Kamjong.
Kan Linn (at the back) with colleagues who have now taken on the role of running a school for the 140 displaced students from Myanmar. | Photo Credit: GREESHMA KUTHAR
Careless statements
All the refugees initially flocked to three locations in Manipur, but to avoid overcrowding they were relocated to eight camps, namely Phaikoh, Skipe, Aloyo, Pilong, Kheronram, Ka Ka, Wanglee, and Namlee. The camps are mixed, with an equal population of Myanmar Buddhist and Kuki-Zo. Everything was going smoothly until people started making careless statements about “illegal immigrants”, which disturbed the already fragile communal fabric in Manipur.
This term is often used derogatorily against people of Kuki-Zo origin. This form of labelling has been happening for a while, with Chief Minister N. Biren Singh not distancing himself from it. In fact, during the peak of the ethnic violence in Manipur, the term became almost a slur, with all Kuki-Zo being referred to as “illegal immigrants from Myanmar”.
Against this backdrop, Biren Singh, who has been accused of stoking communal sentiments and pitting the Meitei against the Kuki-Zo, posted another careless statement on the social media platform X on May 8.
He said: “The government has detected a total of 5,457 illegal immigrants in Kamjong District, Manipur as on May 7. Out of the total, the biometric data of 5,173 such illegal immigrants have been collected so far. Deportation process is under way. We have been giving humanitarian aid to all the illegal immigrants who were detected so far. Despite being an alarming situation, we have been handling it with utmost sensitivity.”
The post led to a flood of misinformation about the identity of the refugees in Kamjong. Messages were shared on social media sites that all of them were Kuki-Zo. In reality, only half of them are Kuki-Zo while the rest are Myanmar Buddhist. Many people in Imphal demanded to know why “Kuki-Chin illegal immigrants” were being housed and fed in Manipur when the valley was in direct conflict with the Kuki-Zo in the hills.
Muddying the waters
As a member of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) group of nations, India has from time to time subscribed to the group’s broader resolutions on Myanmar, supporting “unhindered humanitarian access, resolution of the crisis through constructive dialogue, and the transition of Myanmar towards an inclusive democracy”. Biren Singh’s post, made when the Sagaing region was still under attack, went against this declaration.
A border pillar at the edge of Kamjong district marking the boundary between India and Myanmar. | Photo Credit: GREESHMA KUTHAR
External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar met Myanmar’s Foreign Minister Than Swe on July 11, further complicating India’s position in the context of the civil war in that country. Even as India unofficially provides sanctuary to Myanmarese refugees, there are reports that it has supported the junta militarily since the 2021 coup. Simultaneously, the junta has been accused of sheltering insurgent groups banned by India such as the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and the United National Liberation Front.
In May 2023, Tom Andrews, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar, said in a report that India had supplied $51 million worth of arms and related materials to the Myanmar military since February 2021. In July 2024, Andrews warned that the junta was “trying to destroy a country it cannot control”, noting a substantial spike in military attacks on civilians and public spaces such as schools, hospitals, and monasteries.
In November 2021, The Hindu said that according to an intelligence report, there were about 300 members of the PLA and other insurgent groups across the border and that rubbing shoulders with the Myanmarese army had emboldened the extremists to strike in Manipur.
Since the government has been speaking in multiple voices, there is a lack of clarity about its stance that can lead to further complications along this sensitive border.
BJP deepens divide
Meanwhile, the BJP government in Manipur appears to be using the humanitarian crisis in Myanmar to fuel disinformation in the State and further deepen the Meitei-Kuki-Zo divide. Many Naga leaders are worried that such attempts might lead to the Nagas getting dragged into the conflict, which they have avoided until now.
The presence of refugees in a Naga district is being used to create divisions within, said a leader, speaking on condition of anonymity, suggesting political pressure from Imphal. Organisations in Kamjong maintain that people outside do not understand the reality in the district and are trying to politicise humanitarian efforts.
“Our insecurities cannot be used against us; we are aware of our responsibilities towards those who have sought refuge here, and we will continue to help those in need,” said Souvenir Duidang, a local entrepreneur and member of the RTA.
Lhingneineng shows a picture of her daughter, 16-year-old Nengnaitheng, who left the refugee camp along with her friends to join the rebel forces. | Photo Credit: GREESHMA KUTHAR
The disinformation, though, has reached the refugee camps as well. Mi Neing (51), a Bamar, and Lhingneineng (30), a Kuki-Zo, had fled Myanmar’s Aungzaya and Zedy villages, respectively, to Pilong, and then together to Phaikoh, where they now stay in a camp. When they received messages that they would be deported by Indian authorities within a day, they were panic-stricken until the Deputy Commissioner visited the camp and reassured everyone that the messages were a hoax, and they could stay in their camps until the situation was safe for them to return. Close to 600 refugees have already returned to their villages in Myanmar.
“The rest of us also want to go, but we are scared of aerial strikes. Worse, we are scared of stepping on mines,” Lhingneineng said. There have been incidents where refugees went back to their villages to cultivate their fields, fearing a famine in the coming year, and stepped on landmines. At least two were killed in such incidents. In June, the junta attacked a wedding ceremony in Mataw village of Sagaing region with aerial strikes, killing at least 29. Such incidents have only increased over the past six months, as per a statement of Andrews. The refugees, however, still hope to return by the end of 2024.
Humanitarian crisis
Beyond the threat of landmines, the fear of starvation looms large. Mi Neing said that the supplies they had been getting regularly have slowed down. She fears that it is because of the disinformation being spread about them. Her only request is that she and her family be provided some basic food and medical care to survive. “We won’t be any trouble; this is all we need,” said Mi Neing, pointing to her father who was injured while escaping their township and is now paralysed. Mi Neing’s family survived the previous month by borrowing food from the residents of Phaikoh, and she hopes the government supplies will resume soon.
Lhingneineng’s bigger worry is her daughter, Nengnaitheng. Aged 16, Nengnaitheng left the camp in March along with two of her friends to join the rebel groups in Myanmar. Lhingneineng has not spoken to her daughter since.
The refugees in the camp said that most young men and increasingly even young women are volunteering to join the rebel groups. “All young people in Myanmar have hardened since 2021. They all want to fight the junta,” said Otkhomang K., a retired teacher from Zedy, a village that was burnt down. Many of his students joined the rebel forces after their villages were burnt down, he added.
A walk around the camps revealed that the people there are mostly the elderly, middle-aged men and women, mothers, and young children. There are hardly any young adults.
Within a few months of moving into their designated camp, seeing how restless the children were, Kan Linn and nine other teachers set up a makeshift school. Now, it has 140 students. Seated across each other in an area earmarked as the staff room, all the teachers at the school fell silent when asked where they see themselves in the months to come.
At the centre of the open-air staff room, alongside shelves of textbooks, was a portrait of the late Myanmarese leader Bogyoke Aung San. All the teachers said that they were supporters of Aung San’s politics. The textbooks scattered around the staff room were in Burmese script, books the refugees had managed to salvage from their homes while escaping.
First-person accounts
Initially frightened, a few refugees finally mustered the courage to go back across the border, only to find their villages completely destroyed.
“There was nothing left, the monastery, church, school.... everything in my village was gone,” said Kyawt Kyawtwin (21), a teacher at the school. She said that until October, there was fear in her village of being attacked, but the villagers managed to stay calm. Most of them had heard horror stories of killings and massacres. In one such incident, a schoolteacher named Saw Tun Moe was beheaded and his severed heard impaled on the school gate. He had participated in anti-junta protests and volunteered to keep the high school running, despite the war.
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Many teachers opened up such schools with the support of the NUG, and the junta attacked and destroyed them. The hand sign that civil disobedience movement protesters use is a three-finger salute. Saw Tun Moe’s three fingers were chopped off and placed on his body. “Such incidents are meant to scare us into submission,” said Kyawtin. Now, a defiant Kyawtinn and her associates are ensuring the smooth functioning of the school in the camp, despite the logistical shortcomings.
The camp at Kheronram has more than 1,200 residents. Families have been allotted small shacks, and the shacks are clubbed together under separate numbers. The settlement has been created in a designated area earmarked by the district administration. Because of the number of families, the camps in Kheronram or adjoining areas are very cramped. While half the camps are accessible through motorable roads, three become inaccessible during the rains, making it even more difficult to reach essentials or medical care to the inhabitants.
With the onset of the monsoon, there has been a surge in communicable diseases in the camps, ranging from dysentery to all kinds of fevers. While the refugees are thankful for their safe haven in India, their living conditions and hopelessness paint a grim picture, one that requires compassion and not suspicion.
Greeshma Kuthar is an independent lawyer and journalist from Tamil Nadu. Her primary focus is investigating the evolving methods of the far right, their use of cultural nationalism regionally, and their attempts to assimilate caste identities into the RSS fold.
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