Rakhaing

Guardian Vol.3, No.9 ISBN-1096-438X April 4, 2017

A PUBLICATION OF BUDDHIST RAKHAING CULTURAL ASSOCIATION
NEW YORK CITY, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
www.rakhaingguardian.org
In Defence Of Our Land - The
Patrimony Of Rakhaings
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CLARITY ON THE CONUNDRUM OF BENGALI SEPARATISM
On Bengali separatism the International community sticks its nose in the sand. There are
incontrovertible evidences that constitute documentary proof of the Bengali separatist
movement. The alien Bengalis enforced a preconceived agenda in combination of
insurrectional operation and political maneuvre in order to gain dominion of the settled land.
Rebellion against the host nation to set up an Islamic state was lost in the astute
camouflage of discrimination and persecution. The separatist mentality based on race and
religion got the Bengalis into the plight they are in today. The international focus has been
on religious persecution and racial hatred bearing down upon human rights violations.

THE HORNS OF A DILEMMA : Entrenched in the fervour of Islamic separatism the growing
self-identification of Bengalis as a political group led them to take up arms against the
government for a free Islamic state. Faced with the failure of militancy the profile of the
movement was palliated to alternative resort playing the "Rohingya" card, having interred
the Bengali ethnicity in the charade of a new race. The bigoted Bengalis are confronted by
two equally woeful alternatives. They sow the baneful seeds; they reap what they sow falling
victim to their own acts, making havoc of their life.

THE BASION : The Bengali problem has its root in the British Empire which planted Bengali
settlements in the Arakan Division of Burma (Rakhaing state of Myanmar) as part of massive
transmigration from the Indian sub-Continent that accompanied the British colonial
expansion. Yet, the core of the problem is the separatist mindset of Bengalis, which is
dedicated to a synergic ideology incorporating the Islamic nationalism and racism laying
emphasis on self-identification of the Muslim minority as a political polity, who should have a
separate state of their own, notwithstanding the fact that they are foreign to the land, who
have no legal rights to it whatsoever.

TURNING THE PAGE ON THE PAST : The Bengali separatism has evolved through political
finesses and military maneuvers over the past decades, marked by changes and shifts in the
strategy.
There has been afloat an assertion that the cause of separatism was attributed to the
alleged discrimination against the Muslims by the Buddhist majority on gaining
independence. But it is none other than anachronously corrupted hypothesis which deprives
the public of reality. Burma gained independence in 1948, while the Bengali separatism
raised its head during the British colonial rule as early as 1940 when Bengalis began
agitating for a Muslim state carved out of Rakhaing region, which they pledged to accede to
their former homeland, now Bangladesh.
The immigrant Bengali Muslims and their descendants, who remain faithful and intimately
connected to their motherland, were conjured by the conditions in British India where the
Muslim League contended for creation of a Muslim state out of Hindu majority land.

A delegation of settled Bengalis attended the conference of Muslim League held at Lahore in
March 1940. They were greatly enthused by the rhetoric of Muhammed Ali Jinnah who
declared that the Muslims " must have their homelands, their territory and their state".
Compounded to the incitement was a resolution adopted at the meeting calling for creation
of autonomous and sovereign Muslim states where Muslims were majority, which were to be
welded together into a single Muslim nation.

Driven by the inflammatory rhetoric of Jinnah and enthralled by the fiery resolution of the
meeting the Bengalis set out to agitate for acquisition of a segment of Buddhist majority
land to establish a free Islamic state.
The point is whereas the Muslims in India are native converts and entitled to the rights of a
territory of their own as mandated by the government of British India, while the
immigrant Muslims in Myanmar have no legal entitlement to the land. The Bengali Muslims are an
immigrant community of the Dravidian strain originated from Bengal. The British government did
not recognize them as a group distinct from the Indians in general, let alone a national coterie of
Burma in the name of "Rohingya". They were recorded under the religious group. They were
not among the 24 delegates invited to the 1931 London Conference of
Burma Round Table which was instrumental to separation from British India. Neither were they allowed
to participate in the 1947 Panlong Conference, which laid grounds for national independence, nor
were they featured in the 1947 constitution and its successors.

Having implanted an Islamic foothold and established progeny in Arakan, the rapacious
Bengali Muslims embarked upon the demographic dominance agenda in 1942, who
executed an ethnic cleansing of native Buddhists in Maungdaw and Buthidaung townships,
taking advantage of the administrative transition following retreat of the British Government
to India at the outbreak of the Second World War.

In 1946 they vainly approached Mr.Jinnah offering him to incorporate part of Arakan into the
Muslim nation being appealed to establish in British India. They tried their luck with the
British authorities but flunked in the attempt to have honoured the alleged promise to create
a Muslim enclave supposedly made by certain British military commanders who served on
the Arakan front during the War.

Failing the efforts the Mujtahid insurgency went into action in April 1948 under the aegis of
East Pakistan, striving to realize the projected Islamic state. At the height of the atrocious
insurgency the localities of Maungdaw and Buthidaung were virtually paralyzed and menace
extended to the area of Rathidaung as well as Sittwe, the Administrative hub of the region
before the rebellion was put to rout in 1961. From the early 1940s to the '60s the Muslim
ritualism was in full swing in the border area, adverse to the life of Buddhists.

Whereas the Mujtahids were charged with the military operations the leadership of the
Muslim Congress entered the national politics and thrusted themselves into the
constitutional maneuver in the fulfilment of preordained Islamic agenda. Taking advantage
of the turmoil resulted from the multi-colour insurgency throughout the newly independent
nation state of Burma, the beleaguered government was blackmailed in June 1951, with the
constitutional demands for creation of North Arakan Free Muslim state, which was in line
with the strategy of the Muslin League which demanded the constitutional reform of British
India that laid the foundation for the Muslim state of Pakistan.
The "Charter of Demands of Arakan Muslims" obviously affirms in testimony of separatist
blueprint and bears unequivocal evidence in attestation of the religious connotation of the
Islamic mole of a free Muslim state, calling for the practice of laws and principles of Sharia.
The solicited state was to be constituted in the status of a condominium which should have
the right to establish its own defence force, police and security units. They wanted parity
with the Rakhaing majority in defence, administration and management, with special rights
and protection in order to warrant safeguard their religion and culture.

Laying out the territorial plan the Bengali squatters explicitly defined the exact geographical
boundaries of the projected Islamic state which would encompass Maungdaw and
Buthidaung townships plus part of Rathidaung and half of Akyab (Sittwe), the Administrative
center and port city which was to be governed by the Muslim minority on a par with the
Buddhist majority. The Muslims who did not want to be under the rule of Buddhist majority
were against granting of Rakhaing state, while they wanted a state for their own.
The Mujtahid separatist movement crumbled and a few of the ranks and file surrendered to
the Burmese authorities as part of an amnesty offered in 1961. The rest of military
operatives and political activists sought refuge in Pakistan which refused to extradite Abdul
Kassim, the ringleader.

The moribund Mujtahid separatist movement was resuscitated under the banner of socially
concocted "Rohingya movement" in early 1970's at the advent of the nation of Bangladesh
which picked up the conspiracy from where Pakistan left off.
The Calcutta Journal, FRONTIER describes:" The Rohingya movement drew attention
when in April 1978 Burma launched Operation Naga Min to push the Rohingyas into
Bangladesh after that country through its military attache' in Rangoon along with Libyan
assistance sought to foment a full-scale rebellion and perhaps ultimate annexation by
Bangladesh of Arakan area in Burma. It seems that at the last moment General Zia reverted
to a neutral stand signaling collapse of Bangladesh adventure. In fact, the Rohingyas have
received low level support from across the border ever since 1948 when they expressed
their desire to join their Muslim brothers as part of Pakistan."
Thenceforth, a new breed of Mujtahids, such as Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO),
Arakan Rohingya National Organization (ARNO) and Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front (ARIF)
found their hospitable home in Bangladesh where they received protection of the
government and moral support of the general public, especially the press which made
favourable campaign for the cause of Bengali separatists.

The RSO militants who have links with al-Qaeda, Taliban and Islamic outfits in South and
Southeast Asia, have been active making occasional armed forays into the Rakhaing area
from across the border inflicting loss of lives and destruction of properties of the native
Rakhaings, noticeably the 1994 bombing of the government offices and facilities at
Maungdaw town bordering Bangladesh, and the 2014 ambush on a Myanmar military patrol
killing several soldiers.

THE ANABASIS: The Bengali separatism is not a mirage as deluded. The recent resurgence
of Bengali insurgency in Rakhaing state was only too well to attest to tenacity of the Bengali
separatism being alive and vigorous. The goal as declared by the group was to seize control
of part of Rakhaing state to create a Muslim democratic state for the Bengalis. The
internationally coordinated, new-sprung insurgency which is faithfully locked in the Islamist
fundamentalist ideology, poses a potential threat to the national security and territorial
integrity of Myanmar.
In the wee hours of October 9, 2016 hundreds of Bengali Islamic militants armed with swords
and pistols launched coordinated attacks on three border guard outposts in Maungdaw and
Rathidaung townships that left nine Police Officers dead, with a cache of firearms and
ammunitions looted. In the subsequent security clearance operations hunting down the
perpetrators seven members of the Armed Forces were killed, including a Lt. Colonel.
The operation of massive attacks was directed by the foreign funded, Mecca-based Bengali
insurgent group led by a 45-year-old Muslim man, known by the name of Ata Ullah, one of
his many aliases. He was born in Pakistan to a Bengali father and raised in Saudi Arabia
before he received guerrilla training in Pakistan. The group has training from Taliban and
funding from the Middle East.

According to the report of International Crisis Group (ICG): " The insurgent group, which
refers to itself as Harakah al -Yaqin ( Faith Movement), is led by a committee of Rohingya
emigres in Saudi Arabia and is commanded on the ground by Rohingya with international
training and experience in modern guerrilla war tactics. It benefits from the legitimacy
provided by local and international fatwas ( reportedly from senior clerics in Saudi Arabia,
United Arab Emirates, Pakistan and other countries) in support of its cause and enjoys
considerable sympathy and backing from Muslims in Northern Rakhine state, including
several hundred locally trained recruits."
It was reported that HaY organized its campaign in Bangladesh and involved leaders with
links to Pakistan who only spoke Urdu or English. Several Islamic groups particularly al
Qeada, Taliban and Islamic state raised the Bengali cause.
The collusion against a sovereign nation is an act of war with negative effect on the national
security as well as on its people in violation of the non-interference. It is not to be condoned.
Given the external implication in the insurgency, which amounts to offending the nation's
sovereignty, Myanmar earns the right to crack down the deadly assault, which has profound
effects on the national defence, territorial integrity, peace and security of the people.

Upon the disastrous setback suffered during the clearance operation by the Army the HaY
insurgent group which had called for jihad against Myanmar sought to camouflage its profile,
having labeled itself the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA). In a statement, dated
March 29, 2017, the group declared its dissociation with any terrorist organizations, and set
out a detailed list of 20 demands. They vowed to continue fighting Myanmar. Sure, they keep
killing own people who cooperated with the government and who gave interviews to the
media.

By design or by incidence, the area covered by the simultaneous attacks on Border Guard
posts by the HaY fighters, the latest generation of Bengali insurgents, extends from one end
in the North of Maungdaw township to the other in Rathidaung towards the South, which
corresponds to the geographical boundaries laid out for the Islamic state as put forward by
their forefathers in the 1951 Charter of Demands.
Would not it be assertion of the territorial claim ?

Over the past several decades the Bengali separatists have been operating in political and
religious pretexts under various names, but their paramount goal is the same, which is to set
up an Islamic state. The same wine labeled in different bottles. This toxic seed has grown
through the generations of self-segregated Bengal interlopers who are neither loyal to the
host country nor do they assimilate to the native society.

Being masters of deception and spin the Bengali separatists who take every opportunity to
enforce their sinister political agenda set about trying to bring the separatist movement into
the roaring swirl of international politics, with a view to garnering the public support. And
they are getting it in an awful lot.

Condemning Myanmar on the basis of alleged ethnic cleansing of Bengalis requires a clear
understanding of the historical context of the Bengali separatism and attendant distress of
the natives who have long been aghast at the prospect of losing their ancestral land to the
overwhelming Bengalis who gradually shove them out from their lands. Given the global
impact of Islamist expansion, panting for a worldwide caliphate, the Bengali separatist
movement has advanced to the forefront of national security of Myanmar
.
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Maung Tha Hla is founder president of the Buddhist Rakhaing Cultural Association of the
United States of America. He is the author of THE RAKHAING and ROHINGYA HOAX.