THE number of incidents of rights violation in the three hill districts has declined, as a report that the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti published on January 1 says. The number of incidents that took place in 2024 was 200, down from 240 such incidents that took place in the year before. But, the Annual Report of 2024 on Human Rights Situation in CHT says that the number of victims of rights violation has more than tripled to 6,055 in 2024 from 1,933 in 2023. A member on the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti committee says that although the number of incidents has declined, the number of victims has increased and the intensity of the damage has also remained high mostly because of arson attacks. The report also says that security forces were responsible for 119 of the incidents of rights violation that took place in 2024, affecting 5,655 hill people, who include 5,000 people of the Bawm community alone. In all, 21 national minority people died in 2024, slightly down from the figure of 2023, when 26 people died. The incidents of 2024 left 119 houses burnt and plundered and 2,314 acres of land grabbed by entities from outside the districts, influential people and the settlers. Besides, 12 incidents of sexual violence against 16 hill women and girls by settlers were reported in 2024.
The report observes that the situation in the Chittagong Hill Tracts as a whole has turned bad as there had been no change in the overall situation in the hill region in 2024. And, what is worrying about all this is that none of the people involved in the incidents of rights violation has been held to account or punished. The report says that in about five months after the installation of the interim government, suppressive measures including atrocities against the hill people, land grab, eviction and sectarian violence and arson attacked have continued, leaving the national minorities in a state of fearfulness, uncertainty and insecurity. The report says that there has been no initiative to fully implement the Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Accord that was signed between the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti and the government, when the Awami League was in office, on December 2, 1997. The report levels the allegation of the violation of the Hill District Council Act 1998 as chief executive officers were illegally appointed administrators to the council for a short period and settlers were made members when the councils were reorganised in contravention of the peace accord. The report refers to an absence of justice, citing the dismissal of the case of Kalpana Chakma鈥檚 disappearance that the district administration has failed to resolve by not ensuring a proper trial.
The Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti, in such a situation, seeks that the government should make changes in the state policy, which is, as the report says, against the peace accord and the interests of the hill people, in the light of the July-August mass uprising, which ended the 15 years of the authoritarian regime of the Awami League, which is to end discriminatory practice and bring about reforms.
