As things stand, there is little likelihood of illegal tribal migrants from Bangladesh or Myanmar currently sheltering in India — in Mizoram mainly — of returning home anytime soon. The main reason they have preferred Mizoram as their political sanctuary in India's Northeast is their traditional ethnic links with the Mizos. Among South Asian tribes, blood ties evidently matter more than elsewhere, regardless of national boundaries. Mizos in India regard the Chins settled across the border in Myanmar, or the Bawms of the CHT, not to mention Kukis/Zos of Manipur, as their ethnic cousins.

Significantly, Mizoram government officials have desisted from officially collecting biometric details about the refugees, as directed by the centre. .The reasons are complex, but presumably to avoid a conflict with the ruling NDA regime, local officials point to a shortage of adequate funds. Sources also confirm reports of a strong reluctance among the refugees themselves to hand over their personal details to GOI authorities. Reports and rumours about the calamitous National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise in Assam, where millions of people were made to prove their ethnic origins and identities, in a harebrained bid to determine their status as 'genuine' Indian citizens, have left many tribal groups uneasy about GOI's long term objectives and very suspicious about its data collection methods.

Constant official threats about the Central and Assam Governments being determined to throw out people who could not furnish much supporting documentary 'evidence' of their ancestors living in India, have left the larger tribal community in the NE region somewhat confused and fragmented.. At the best of times, Christian tribes have been deeply distrustful of the political objectives of the BJP-dominated NDA Government, which they see as a rightwing militant Hindu party.

Apparently learning no lessons from the fiasco over the NRC registration in Assam, where only a small group of people failed to provide conclusive evidence of their citizenship as sought officially, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has threatened to launch yet another NRC operation. This, after the central and Assam Governments ended up spending nearly Rs 1600 crore over the ill-conceived, exercise which has not resulted in any large scale deportation of people to Bangladesh or anywhere else.

It remains to be seen whether GOI also shares Sarma’s enthusiasm for a new round of NRC ops, especially after his total failure in assessing /controlling the breakdown of civil governance in neighbouring Manipur state. As its most prominent face in the region, Sarma had been given a free hand as a strategist, charting out a new policy course in a new political territory. His forays into Manipur and related issues, involving a series of meetings with the state Chief Minister and Central BJP leaders, have not succeeded at all, to put it mildly.

No wonder the present group of refugees in Mizoram is hardly enthusiastic about the GOI's proposed biometric data collection. They see it as a first step towards a possible deportation back to Myanmar or Bangladesh. .

As for Sarma's continuing bluster about pushing people back into Bangladesh, it needs stressing that Dhaka, even under the supposedly pro-Indian Sheikh Hasina as the Prime Minister had never agreed to approve anyone's 'pushback' from India without authorities first satisfying themselves that the people involved were really Bangladeshis. The present interim rulers running Bangladesh are far more likely to dismiss GOI"s demands on such sensitive matters summarily, Sarma or no Sarrma! Further, even while Hasina was ruling Bangladesh, GOI had always assured her and the then ruling Awami League collectively, that Dhaka had nothing to fear from India's drive to identify and act against 'illegal infiltrators', time and again.

As for Myanmar, which has consistently refused to take back even a handful of its own Muslim Rohingya citizens sheltering in Bangladesh for years now despite immense international pressure, the prospect of the 32000-plus Chin tribals who have crossed over into India after February 2021, returning home peacefully as a result of official negotiations involving governments in the region, does not look promising. India, fear some Northeast based observers, could well end up facing a situation, in its own Northeast region, with the Burmese Chins playing the role of the stranded Rohingyas as in Bangladesh, albeit on a much reduced scale.

Naturally with both GOI and Mizo authorities acting out of their own political compulsions, it appears GOI's bid to keep track and monitor the movement of the illegal tribal migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh may be difficult to carry out. The Union Home Ministry had instructed Mizoram authorities in April 2023 to begin the biometric registration of refugees from Myanmar, ('clarifying that they were to be treated as 'illegal immigrants’) and complete the process by September 2023.. Delhi had instructed Mizoram Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh .not to encourage the illegal migration from Myanmar and to handle relief measures with great care. .

Among these states, only Mizoram stood out in declaring that it could not stop relief operations for the Chins in view of the old tribal linkages going back several centuries. Christian organisations and agencies also announced help for Mizoram, which was increased later as violence against the Kukis in Manipur forced them to rush to Mizoram for help. In between tribals from the CHT area in Bangladesh also fled their homes in the hills as the Bangladesh army began an operation against them. They too made a beeline for Mizoram.

Initially the bulk of the migrants came from Myanmar, from where the tribal exodus started after the February 2021army coup, which soon led to a prolonged civil war. In some areas it became a conflict between the 'Buddhist' army versus the mainly' Christian' tribes like the Chins which had been fighting their own battles for their political autonomy earlier, too. Soon, Western countries as well as 'agencies' began supplying opposing dissident groups in Myanmar with modern arms and weapons. Bottom line: Naypitaw based army authorities, mainly backed by Russia and China, now control only a part of their country, while the civil war rages in the provinces.

Mizoram which had initially agreed with Delhi to carry out the biometric registration of the migrants, later objected to the proposal mainly because of the local concern for the future prospects and present welfare of their ethnic cousins,. as the political turmoil continued in Myanmar and has now spread to Bangladesh. The state Government has informed the centre of its decision not to go ahead with the official recording of the refugees' details, in view of the sensitivity of the situation. Any official move on Delhi's part to repatriate the Chins and other groups to Myanmar or Bangladesh should take place only after peace had returned in the South Asian neighbourhood as a whole, Mizoram Government has declared.

Meanwhile according to official sources the number of illegal migrants staying in various camps in Mizoram currently exceeds 42,000, showing an increase of over 1500 heads since February this year. Most arrivals in recent weeks have been from Bangladesh, where widespread civil unrest has been reported since Aug 5 this year. (IPA Service)