Important: In Jumland (Chittagong Hill Tracts) the Jummo/ Jumma are Buddhist (Changma/ chakma, marma), Hinduist (Tripura), Christian and animist but Bengali settlers and the army are muslims from Bangladesh.
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Kabita Chakma is the coordinator of the CHT Jumma Peoples Network of
the Asia Pacific and the Human Rights Coordinator of the CHT
Indigenous Jumma Association Australia.
---------------------------------------------
Home | OP-ED | Kalindi Rani: 19th century Chakma queen regnant
Kalindi Rani: 19th century Chakma queen regnant
by Kabita Chakma
March 8, 2011 is the centenary of International Women’s Day, a global celebration of the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. On the occasion of the centenary of International Women’s Day, I would like to introduce an extraordinary 19th century woman, Kalindi Rani, a queen regnant from South Asia.
I have two intersecting interests in introducing Kalindi Rani: firstly, Kalindi Rani’s struggle to establish herself as the queen regnant, rajrani, against the British and the existing patriarchal and patrilineal Chakma society; and secondly, Kalindi Rani’s struggle against the British colonisation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the southeast part of present day Bangladesh. However, Kalindi Rani remains largely absent from either the feminist discourse or the historical discourse of Bangladesh or South Asia.
Kalindi Rani’s life immediately precedes that of another notable woman, Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hussain (also written as Begum Roquiah Sakhawat Hussain) who was also born in present-day Bangladesh. Begum
Rokeya was born in 1880, seven years after Kalindi Rani’s death in 1873. Begum Rokeya was born in Pairaband, Rangpur, in British Bengal, while Kalindi Rani was born in a village called Kudukchari, on the base of Mount Phuramon in Rangamati, in pre-British, independent Chakma kingdom. Begum Rokeya is well known as an educator, writer, and a social worker, and is also celebrated as the first Islamic feminist.
Kalindi Rani, the Chakma queen regnant, was the 45th ruler in the history of the Chakma monarchy. She ruled the traditional Chakma kingdom, at the eastern edge of then British India, including parts of Chittagong and the Chittagong Hill Tracts of present-day Bangladesh from 1832 to1873. Kalindi Rani also had estates (zamindari) in the British-regulated district of Chittagong.
Kalindi Rani didn’t use armed resistance against British aggression as did her predecessors of the late 18th century, who fought over two and a half decades of war against the British between 1772 and 1798 (Suniti Bhushan Qanungo, 1998, Chakma Resistance to British Domination: 1772–1798). It is noteworthy that this resistance is the first recorded against the British in South Asia, long before the famous ‘sipahi bidroha’, the ‘Sepoy Rebellion’ in 1857. Rather than armed resistance, Kalindi Rani used western institutions, the courts and offices, and traditional agencies to resist colonisation.
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KALINDI Rani resisted both the institutions of Chakma patriarchy by establishing herself as the queen regnant, and resisted the institutions of power of the coloniser by assuming the throne and in protecting her kingdom, which the British annexed in 1860.
It was difficult for Kalindi Rani to assume the throne after her husband Raja Dharam Bux Khan died in 1832. The raja died in his mid-thirties, leaving three wives: Kalindi, the first wife; Atakbi, the second wife; and Haribi, the third wife. His only daughter Rajkumari Menaka was by his third wife Haribi. Chakma monarchy generally follows the law of primogeniture, which means that the eldest son succeeds the father. This could not be applied in the case of succession of Raja Dharm Bux Khan.
In 1832, to formalise her claim to the throne as the guardian of her stepdaughter Menaka, Kalindi Rani offered to pay the ‘Jum Banga’ tax to the British. The tax was introduced by the British in 1791 replacing a ‘cotton tribute’, and became a Permanent Settlement in 1793. According to historian AM Serajuddin, however, the Permanent Settlement of 1793 was a result of misinterpretation by the successive British administrators in which the tribute was treated as a revenue payable to the government (The Chakma Tribe of the Chittagong Hill Tracts in the 18th century, The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, No. 1, 1984, pp 90-98, p 94).
Chakma society did not, however, favour a female ruler. There were many conspiracies against her, and many opportunist groups initiating family feuds against Rani’s assumption of the throne.
Gobardhan, the adopted brother of the late Raja Dharam Bux Khan, was a prominent contestant for the throne. Gobardhan had patriarchal and historical precedence as his grandfather Raja Jabbar Khan succeeded
his brother Raja Tabbar Khan when he died childless in 1799. There was also mention of other collateral male heirs contending for the throne. Gobardhan and other contending heirs took their claims to the British authority, but ultimately failed. It appears that the British authority ultimately rejected the claims of Gobardhan and other contending heirs for the throne, perhaps because of Kalindi’s strategic use of western institutions. It is reported that Kalindi Rani’s use of the courts put Gobardhan and the other collateral male heirs in jail on a charge of rebellion and riot.
Taking advantage of the chaotic situation in Kalindi Rani’s realm, the British instituted a Court of Wards. The British, by acting as the guardian of the Princess Menaka, took over the royal estates in both Chittagong and the Chakma kingdom.
Family rivalry against Kalindi Rani eventually also came from the late Raja’s third wife Haribi Rani. It is recorded that in the midst of these turbulent years, Haribi, without consulting Kalindi, organized Menaka’s wedding with a Gopinath Dewan, and moved out of the palace (rajbari) to live with her daughter and son-in-law in a house she built at Sonaichari, a village near the capital Rajanagar in Rangunea.
Kalindi didn’t go through the futile exercise of trying to stop Haribi. She neither protested against the daughter’s wedding nor against Haribi’s relocation, but instead concentrated her energy on regaining control over the kingdom and estates in Chittagong.
After Kalindi Rani had succeeded in retaining her kingdom’s property, it is known that Haribi, with her daughter Menaka and son-in-law, returned to the palace upon receiving the pardon they had sought from the Rani. Later, Harish Chandra, son of Princess Menaka, would become raja upon Kalindi Rani’s death on September 22, 1873.
***
FOR Kalindi Rani, however, the struggle with the British authorities over the throne was even longer and more tortured than with the Chakma contestants for the throne.
To secure her right to rule, Kalindi first lodged a claim in the Judge’s Court, Chittagong, for the sole management of the estates in Chittagong. She also went to the Judge’s Court to establish her rights over the kingdom, outside the British regulation district of Chittagong.
Although Kalindi Rani’s succession to all the property of her late husband was supported by the civil court in 1832, and in 1833 the collector recommended that she should be in charge of all property and all property should be in her name, there was some withholding by the British authorities from fully recognising Kalindi Rani as the successor of her husband. A letter, dated August 26, 1842, from the commissioner of Chittagong indicates doubt about her capacity to manage the property.
In response to Rani’s appeal in 1932 for the sole management of all properties, the court appointed Shukalal Khan, a Dewan and a paternal relative of the late Raja, as a ‘sarbarakar’, meaning a person ‘having an authority to collect taxes’, until there was a decision about the legitimacy of Kalindi Rani’s claim to the throne. Many Chakmas did not accept the appointment by the British. As a consequence, there was an upheaval against the rule of law in the hill tracts. It appears that at that period many of the dewans, Chakma aristocrats, adopted the trappings of kings. This generally unstable situation was made worse by attacks from the neighbouring Lushai group. It is suspected that the dewans were hiring the Lushais to attack each other. It is not known on which date, but it is reported that during those chaotic years Shuklal Khan was murdered in his own residence by Lushais.
During these times of political struggle, Kalindi Rani tried every avenue to regain control over her kingdom’s property, even by leasing her own lands back from the British. By 1837 Kalindi managed to obtain the kingdom’s properties by leasing. But she denounced the leasing arrangement in 1839 and subsequently maintained her fight in the courts for permanent authority over her kingdom’s property.
Although gender bias was present to varying degrees in both the Chakma and British societies in different contexts, there were historical examples of both societies having female rulers. The Chakmas had previously had two queens regnant, Manekbi Rani and Kattua Rani, while the British had had Elizabeth I as queen regnant in the 17th century. Alexandrina Victoria, who assumed the British throne in 1837, was a contemporary to Kalindi Rani. However, no reference has yet been found that the British ever drew any comparison between the queens regnant in England and in the hill tracts.
British displeasure with Kalindi Rani was perhaps because of her gender, but more about her unwillingness to submit to the will of the British in the running of her own territory. British discontent may also have been to do with the colonial administrators’ anxiety and suspicion over her ability to yield tax for the colonial exchequer. It may, therefore, have been Rani’s non-cooperation with the economic interest of the British that deterred the authority from recognising her as the successor to Raja Dharam Bux Khan.
Finally, after 12 years of struggle, in 1844, the court issued an order that Kalindi Rani was the sole representative of all the properties of the late Raja Dharam Bux Khan. While Kalindi Rani established her rights to the properties of her kingdom and estates, the British never formally recognised Kalindi Rani’s position beyond that of a ‘sarbarakar’ or principal tax collector.
Kalindi Rani’s position as queen regnant is still a paradox in Chakma society. The present Chakma monarch, Raja Devasish Roy, the 50th raja, who is a barrister-at-law, states that in accordance with Chakma customary law, ‘Kalindi held—de facto—the Chakma rulership.’ However, in the history of the Chakma Raj, Kalindi Rani is recorded as the 45th ruler, the queen regnant of that time.
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IN 1860, the British annexed the traditional Chakma kingdom as a part of a district naming it the Chittagong Hill Tracts by the Act XXII of 1860. The annexation came in the guise of providing security to the inhabitants of the hills, against the possible raids from the Kukis from the north-east hills. There is no evidence that the Chakmas had ever asked for protection from the British, instead there is evidence of Chakmas fighting the British in coalition with the Kukis during the Chakma resistance in the late 18th century. Whereas there has always been an underlying economic interest on the part of the British in the CHT.
In 1860, the Chittagong Hill Tracts had two major chiefs: Kalindi Rani in the north and centre; and the Bhomang Raja in the south. However, there were also some other chieftains from smaller indigenous groups who exercised authority over their people. Without formal recognition they were gradually forgotten.
The 1860 general instructions of the British government for the guidance of the hill tracts authorities included that ‘The customs and prejudices of the people [are] to be observed and respected. We are to interfere as little as possible between the chiefs and their tribes’ (Government of Bengal, Letter No. 3300, June 20, 1860).
Violation of the 1860 instructions is evident in the division of the Chakma kingdom into two parts, which the Rani resisted. Captain Thomas Herbert Lewin was appointed in the Chittagong Hill Tracts as the third superintendent in March 1866 and as the first deputy commissioner in 1868. Lewin, violating the 1860 instructions, appointed a Maung Kioja Sain, a Marma aristocrat (a roaza of Rani), as a ‘sarbarakar’ to collect revenue of the northern part of the Chakma kingdom. In October 1867, to formalise the partitioning of the northern part, Lewin recommended that the Hill Tracts should be divided into three revenue divisions or circles, respectively under the authority of the three chiefs.
Kalindi Rani took the matter to the court, but her appeal was rejected in 1870. In explaining the reason for dividing Rani’s kingdom it was noted that: ‘[t]hough nominally the northern section belonged to the Chakma Chief, yet owing to the distances there was no control over the people, and great inconveniences was experienced by the absence of any head to whom references could be made when occasion arose’ (Eastern Bengal and Assam District Gazetteers: Chittagong Hill Tracts, 1909, p 12). To protect the southern boundary, Kalindi Rani made a written agreement with the Bhomang chief in 1869.
Kalindi Rani not only lodged complaints against violation of the 1860 instructions to the commissioner in Chittagong, she also sent Harish Chandra, her grandson and future heir, to see the lieutenant-governor of Bengal in Calcutta to register her complaints. As a result, there was an independent inquiry into the CHT administration. It found that the regulations were not being sufficiently observed.
In 1873, the year Kalindi Rani died, the proposal containing division into circles, initially proposed by Lewin in 1867, was considered and it came into effect in 1884 creating a third circle known as the Mong circle. Thus, Rani’s kingdom was reduced to only one of the circles a number of years after her death.
Despite her resistance, Kalindi Rani’s rule saw the unfolding process in which the British ultimately proclaimed power over the indigenous authorities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. The time of her reign was one of the most turbulent in Chakma history as it saw the transition of the Chakmas from an independent people to subjects of the British.
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KALINDI Rani’s rule of the Chakma Kingdom from 1832 to1873 exposes an indomitable leadership. British bureaucrat RH Sneyd Hutchinson’s statement provides an insight of the British view of Kalindi Rani, ‘…[F]or forty years she proved a thorn in the side of the Government, she was an exceedingly able woman, and having surrounded herself with Bengali Lawyers from Chittagong, fought very hard to avoid meeting her obligation, and put forward all sorts of real and Imaginary claims to land settlements in the Chittagong District itself. She exercised a very great influence over her tribe and was generally feared’ (An Account of Chittagong Hill Tracts, 1906, p 94).
From a feminist perspective, it is quite refreshing for me to present the queen regnant of nearly two centuries ago in the contemporary gender equality debate of the Chakmas. Consideration of Kalindi Rani, the queen regnant, a widow without a male heir but with a stepdaughter, allows serious questioning of today’s treatment of women under the traditional customary inheritance law of the patrilineal society of the Chakmas, where gender inequalities in both royal and commoner practices are evident.
It is noteworthy that recently, on February 8, 2011, the Chakma women, with their other indigenous sisters of the CHT, submitted a memorandum claiming recognition of equal inheritance rights for the Chakma women
to Raja Devasish Roy, Chakma Raja, Chief of the Chakma Administrative Circle, at a summit of the hill women organised by Women Resource Network in Rangamati.
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Some parts of this article were presented in a paper ‘Kalindi Rani: The Formidable Chakma Queen Regnant of the 19th Century’, at the tenth anniversary of Women in Asia conference on Crisis, Agency, and Change at the Australian National University, Canberra, September 29-October 1, 2010. Kabita Chakma is the coordinator of the CHT Jumma Peoples Network of the Asia Pacific and the Human Rights Coordinator of the CHT Indigenous Jumma Association Australia.
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Re-membering Kalpana Chakma
Re-membering our solidarity for gender equality, justice and peace
by Kabita Chakma
Re-membering our solidarity for gender equality, justice and peace
by Kabita Chakma
KALPANA Chakma is a well-known name of a forcefully disappeared political and human rights activist of Bangladesh. Her forceful disappearance is not only known in Bangladesh, but widely known in South Asia and many other parts of the world where human rights activists continue to keep their vigil alive for gender equality, justice and peace.
At the time of her kidnapping, Kalpana was the organising secretary of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Hill Women’s Federation (shortly known as the HWF), a BA student at Baghaichari Kachalong College, and she was young, in her early 20s. She was kidnapped, allegedly by a group of civil clothed military and Village Defence Party men led by Lt Ferdous Khan from her home in New Lallyaghona, a remote village in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, in the early hours of June 12, 1996, on a day of national elections in Bangladesh. She has not been heard from since. No one responsible for the abduction has been yet brought to justice.
At the time of her kidnapping, Kalpana was the organising secretary of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Hill Women’s Federation (shortly known as the HWF), a BA student at Baghaichari Kachalong College, and she was young, in her early 20s. She was kidnapped, allegedly by a group of civil clothed military and Village Defence Party men led by Lt Ferdous Khan from her home in New Lallyaghona, a remote village in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, in the early hours of June 12, 1996, on a day of national elections in Bangladesh. She has not been heard from since. No one responsible for the abduction has been yet brought to justice.
This year, June 12 was the 15th anniversary of Kalpana Chakma Abduction Day. After long 14 years, in September 2010, the abduction of Kalpana is ordered for re-investigation by the chief judicial magistrate of the Rangamati district court as her brother Kalindi Kumar Chakma rejected the final police report filed with the court at the end of August 2010. The lawyer conducting the case on behalf on the plaintiff explained to the Suprobhat Bangladesh, a Bengali daily published from Chittagong, that, because the final report on the abduction of Kalpana Chakma was inaccurate and the investigation was not carried out in an appropriate manner, they made an appeal for a re-investigation. In September 1996, three months after Kalpana's abduction, and under national and international pressure, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina set up a three-member enquiry commission, including Justice Abdul Jalil (chairperson), Shakhawat Hossain, deputy commissioner of Chittagong and Professor Anupam Sen of Chittagong University.
This essay, ‘Re-membering Kalpana’ is not simply to remember Kalpana, but to ‘re-member’, to ‘put together’, the journey of Kalpana and her fellow travellers, the indigenous and Bengali citizens of Bangladesh, particularly indigenous and non-indigenous women, to fight injustice, gender violence in the CHT. The CHT alarmingly remains a site of gross human rights violations as Lars-Anders Baer, the UN special rapporteur, highlights in his April 2011 report that there are ‘arbitrary arrests, torture, extra-judicial killings, harassment of rights activists and sexual harassment.’ Kalpana can be re-membered on her own right, as a brave and vocal
activist, and through today’s many major issues which confront us, our consciousness, our humanity, our sense of justice, and inspire us to extend ourselves beyond Bangladesh, to make us active globally for equality and justice, for the greater good of all human beings.
This essay, ‘Re-membering Kalpana’ is not simply to remember Kalpana, but to ‘re-member’, to ‘put together’, the journey of Kalpana and her fellow travellers, the indigenous and Bengali citizens of Bangladesh, particularly indigenous and non-indigenous women, to fight injustice, gender violence in the CHT. The CHT alarmingly remains a site of gross human rights violations as Lars-Anders Baer, the UN special rapporteur, highlights in his April 2011 report that there are ‘arbitrary arrests, torture, extra-judicial killings, harassment of rights activists and sexual harassment.’ Kalpana can be re-membered on her own right, as a brave and vocal
activist, and through today’s many major issues which confront us, our consciousness, our humanity, our sense of justice, and inspire us to extend ourselves beyond Bangladesh, to make us active globally for equality and justice, for the greater good of all human beings.
This essay, however, will deal with only two out of many issues through which Kalpana can be re-membered today: the coalition of indigenous and non-indigenous human rights activists; and the demand for women’s rights as equal rights in Bangladesh.
The CHT still remains a militarised, colonised land within de-colonised Bangladesh. The CHT is not a war zone. The CHT Accord was signed in 1997 ending over two decades of war, demobilising the Shanti Bahini, the guerrilla wing of the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samiti, and stipulating de-militarisation of the CHT. But, the United Nations’ April 2011 report, mentioned earlier, states that one-third of the military of Bangladesh is stationed in the CHT, which is only 10 per cent of the land of the country. The government’s justification of six cantonments or barracks in the three districts of the CHT, however, is excessive in comparison to 14 cantonments in the rest of the 61 districts of Bangladesh. Or, to put it in another way, having six cantonments in the CHT, which comprises only 10 per cent of the land of Bangladesh, in comparison to 14 cantonments for the rest 90 per cent of the land is highly disproportional. Kalpana's struggle for establishing peace and justice in the CHT was put to an end before the signing of the CHT Accord. She was kidnapped a year and half before the accord, during the heavy military insurgency in the CHT. It should first be pointed out that very few were working publicly in political and human rights field at that period, because of the grave difficulties of the situation. The situation was partly portrayed by the CHT Commission, which made a conservative estimate in 1991 that there was one security force for every 10 people in the CHT. In the early 1990s, effective and seasoned women human rights activists were rare in Bangladesh and even rarer in the highly militarised context of the CHT. Under these circumstance, Kalpana’s activism in the public sphere for peace and justice—with little or no support, and knowing what the consequences may be—in itself does her great credit. It is unusual to find that someone so young can be such an active, effective and mature leader. As a Year Twelve (HSC) student she was involved in organising the first National Conference of the Hill Women’s Federation. She also organised the first celebration of International Women’s Day in her village. Kalpana was instrumental in bringing the message of human rights, indigenous people’s rights and women’s rights to women in small villages who had never encountered these liberating possibilities. Kalpana’s thoughts and aspiration contained in her diary and published with the title ‘Kalpana Chakma’s Diary’, is no more limited to remote Lallyaghona, or the CHT. Her writings inform us of injustices in the hills of Bangladesh and inspire us, all indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, to act against those injustices, and they will continue to inspire many more generations in Bangladesh and beyond. In the 1980s, the mainstream women’s movement in Bangladesh took a robust and vibrant form adding new dimensions to the country’s many decades’ tradition of women’s rights movement, which was formally established by women’s organisations from the late 1940s, primarily focusing on women’s welfare, education, skills, income generation and childcare. In the 1980s, an exponential growth of non-governmental organisations in the country, except in the CHT where the government did not permit NGO activities, witnessed the birth of new women’s organisations with new direction to work for gender equality. These
organisations aimed to protest against gender-based discrimination and continue to work to bring an end to discriminatory practices against women in economic, political and social sectors, including violence against women, dowry, acid throwing, sexual harassment, rape, trafficking of women, unequal wages, work place exploitation, access to credit and unequal political and social rights. In the CHT, the Hill Women’s Federation, a voluntary organisation, remained active since its formation on March 8, 1988 by a group of women studying at Chittagong University as a sole organisation until the late 1990s. By 1990s, a limited number of individual Jumma women writers, poets, activists and researchers were writing articles, poems, reports and research-based theses to campaign against institutionalised gender violence in the CHT, and some of them were actively participating and addressing many international fora and conferences, including the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Population, and the First Asian Indigenous Women Conference in 1993. The 1980s mainstream women’s collective new movement in Bangladesh, however, was non-inclusive of the concern of the Hill Women’s Federation against the state’s institutionalised discrimination of the CHT indigenous women. CHT women’s movement against state repression remained alien to the mainstream women’s movement in Bangladesh for about one and half decades. In a way, Kalpana’s abduction in 1996 and the campaign against her abduction remained central to the coalition of indigenous and non-indigenous women’s movement in Bangladesh.
In the years prior to Kalpana’s kidnapping, solidarity was developing between mainstream women’s organisations, constituted largely by middle-class Bengali women, and the indigenous CHT women activists. In March 1994, the Hill Women’s Federation, with their slogan ‘Autonomy for Peace’, joined the rally of the national women’s movement to celebrate International Women’s Day. As an outcome of this cooperation, the Hill Women’s Federation joined the National Preparatory Committee Towards Beijing, a coalition of national NGOs, preparing a status report on women in Bangladesh for the 4th UN Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995. The long absence of a collective recognition of CHT women’s struggle by the mainstream women’s new movement generated in the 1980s, however, can be traced in the outcome of the status report on women for the Beijing conference. Many long months had been put into working with the national NGO committee, and during that, the Hill Women’s Federation had emphasised that the military oppression against the CHT indigenous Jumma women must be highlighted in the status report. However, the report later failed to project the federation’s primary concern of sexual oppression of indigenous CHT women by the military, the point was entirely written out of the final set of issues that were presented at Beijing. This occurred despite the fact that the Hill Women’s Federation’s leaflet in 1995 Beijing conference had reported that ‘[o]ver 94% of the all alleged cases of rape of Jumma women between 1991 and 1993 in the CHT were by “security forces”.’ Of these rape allegations, over 40 per cent of the victims were children. While countless abductions and other repression against indigenous women went unnoticed, Kalpana’s case, a high-profile activist’s abduction, led by a ranked military officer, came to be the irrefutable evidence of military atrocities against the indigenous women of the CHT. Fifteen years on, her abductors roam free, like all other perpetrators against gross human rights violation in the CHT, as stark evidence of the culture of impunity that prevails. Early this year, the issue was reiterated to the UN special rapporteur on violence against women that, ‘[t]he biggest concern in rape and other violence against women in the CHT now is the lack of access to justice and absolute impunity that perpetrators enjoy’ (Hana Shams Ahmed, ‘Multiple forms of discrimination experienced by indigenous women from
Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) within nationalist framework’, a paper
presented at APWLD, SRVAW Consultation, Kuala Lumpur, January 11-12, 2011).
The CHT still remains a militarised, colonised land within de-colonised Bangladesh. The CHT is not a war zone. The CHT Accord was signed in 1997 ending over two decades of war, demobilising the Shanti Bahini, the guerrilla wing of the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samiti, and stipulating de-militarisation of the CHT. But, the United Nations’ April 2011 report, mentioned earlier, states that one-third of the military of Bangladesh is stationed in the CHT, which is only 10 per cent of the land of the country. The government’s justification of six cantonments or barracks in the three districts of the CHT, however, is excessive in comparison to 14 cantonments in the rest of the 61 districts of Bangladesh. Or, to put it in another way, having six cantonments in the CHT, which comprises only 10 per cent of the land of Bangladesh, in comparison to 14 cantonments for the rest 90 per cent of the land is highly disproportional. Kalpana's struggle for establishing peace and justice in the CHT was put to an end before the signing of the CHT Accord. She was kidnapped a year and half before the accord, during the heavy military insurgency in the CHT. It should first be pointed out that very few were working publicly in political and human rights field at that period, because of the grave difficulties of the situation. The situation was partly portrayed by the CHT Commission, which made a conservative estimate in 1991 that there was one security force for every 10 people in the CHT. In the early 1990s, effective and seasoned women human rights activists were rare in Bangladesh and even rarer in the highly militarised context of the CHT. Under these circumstance, Kalpana’s activism in the public sphere for peace and justice—with little or no support, and knowing what the consequences may be—in itself does her great credit. It is unusual to find that someone so young can be such an active, effective and mature leader. As a Year Twelve (HSC) student she was involved in organising the first National Conference of the Hill Women’s Federation. She also organised the first celebration of International Women’s Day in her village. Kalpana was instrumental in bringing the message of human rights, indigenous people’s rights and women’s rights to women in small villages who had never encountered these liberating possibilities. Kalpana’s thoughts and aspiration contained in her diary and published with the title ‘Kalpana Chakma’s Diary’, is no more limited to remote Lallyaghona, or the CHT. Her writings inform us of injustices in the hills of Bangladesh and inspire us, all indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, to act against those injustices, and they will continue to inspire many more generations in Bangladesh and beyond. In the 1980s, the mainstream women’s movement in Bangladesh took a robust and vibrant form adding new dimensions to the country’s many decades’ tradition of women’s rights movement, which was formally established by women’s organisations from the late 1940s, primarily focusing on women’s welfare, education, skills, income generation and childcare. In the 1980s, an exponential growth of non-governmental organisations in the country, except in the CHT where the government did not permit NGO activities, witnessed the birth of new women’s organisations with new direction to work for gender equality. These
organisations aimed to protest against gender-based discrimination and continue to work to bring an end to discriminatory practices against women in economic, political and social sectors, including violence against women, dowry, acid throwing, sexual harassment, rape, trafficking of women, unequal wages, work place exploitation, access to credit and unequal political and social rights. In the CHT, the Hill Women’s Federation, a voluntary organisation, remained active since its formation on March 8, 1988 by a group of women studying at Chittagong University as a sole organisation until the late 1990s. By 1990s, a limited number of individual Jumma women writers, poets, activists and researchers were writing articles, poems, reports and research-based theses to campaign against institutionalised gender violence in the CHT, and some of them were actively participating and addressing many international fora and conferences, including the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Population, and the First Asian Indigenous Women Conference in 1993. The 1980s mainstream women’s collective new movement in Bangladesh, however, was non-inclusive of the concern of the Hill Women’s Federation against the state’s institutionalised discrimination of the CHT indigenous women. CHT women’s movement against state repression remained alien to the mainstream women’s movement in Bangladesh for about one and half decades. In a way, Kalpana’s abduction in 1996 and the campaign against her abduction remained central to the coalition of indigenous and non-indigenous women’s movement in Bangladesh.
In the years prior to Kalpana’s kidnapping, solidarity was developing between mainstream women’s organisations, constituted largely by middle-class Bengali women, and the indigenous CHT women activists. In March 1994, the Hill Women’s Federation, with their slogan ‘Autonomy for Peace’, joined the rally of the national women’s movement to celebrate International Women’s Day. As an outcome of this cooperation, the Hill Women’s Federation joined the National Preparatory Committee Towards Beijing, a coalition of national NGOs, preparing a status report on women in Bangladesh for the 4th UN Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995. The long absence of a collective recognition of CHT women’s struggle by the mainstream women’s new movement generated in the 1980s, however, can be traced in the outcome of the status report on women for the Beijing conference. Many long months had been put into working with the national NGO committee, and during that, the Hill Women’s Federation had emphasised that the military oppression against the CHT indigenous Jumma women must be highlighted in the status report. However, the report later failed to project the federation’s primary concern of sexual oppression of indigenous CHT women by the military, the point was entirely written out of the final set of issues that were presented at Beijing. This occurred despite the fact that the Hill Women’s Federation’s leaflet in 1995 Beijing conference had reported that ‘[o]ver 94% of the all alleged cases of rape of Jumma women between 1991 and 1993 in the CHT were by “security forces”.’ Of these rape allegations, over 40 per cent of the victims were children. While countless abductions and other repression against indigenous women went unnoticed, Kalpana’s case, a high-profile activist’s abduction, led by a ranked military officer, came to be the irrefutable evidence of military atrocities against the indigenous women of the CHT. Fifteen years on, her abductors roam free, like all other perpetrators against gross human rights violation in the CHT, as stark evidence of the culture of impunity that prevails. Early this year, the issue was reiterated to the UN special rapporteur on violence against women that, ‘[t]he biggest concern in rape and other violence against women in the CHT now is the lack of access to justice and absolute impunity that perpetrators enjoy’ (Hana Shams Ahmed, ‘Multiple forms of discrimination experienced by indigenous women from
Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) within nationalist framework’, a paper
presented at APWLD, SRVAW Consultation, Kuala Lumpur, January 11-12, 2011).
The abduction of Kalpana, however, broke the amnesia of many
mainstream human rights activists of Bangladesh regarding the CHT
situation. There was, and has been, support and solidarity from many mainstream human rights activists and their organisations, and a rise in increasing solidarity for CHT indigenous women’s cause from the mainstream women rights organisations. In the period immediately after Kalpana’s abduction, strong cooperation developed between mainstream Bengali women particularly represented by ‘Shommilita Nari Shomaj’ (literally meaning Collective Women’s Society) and indigenous women of the CHT in their protests against the lack of action over the abduction. ‘Shommilita Nari Shomaj’ was formed in August 1995 to protest state violence against women following an incident where a 13-year-old Bengali girl, Yasmin, was raped and then killed by three policemen in the northern district of Dinajpur. It was a coalition of mainstream Bengali women’s organisations including human rights organisations, development-oriented organisations, women activists from the Left, trade unions, lawyers, academics and students. Women belonging to the Hill Women’s Federation joined in to protest on the streets of Dhaka. In the wake of the campaign, NGOs and civil society organisations from 37 countries asked the Bangladesh government to rescue Kalpana Chakma immediately and conduct an inquiry into the incident. In many ways, Kalpana brought us together: indigenous and non-indigenous women in Bangladesh, Jumma indigenous women of CHT with other women of the world, and men who are indigenous, non-indigenous, Bengali, and non-Bengali.
In the second decade of the 21st century, the women’s movement of
Bangladesh shows ample possibilities to be inclusive of indigenous women's issues. The December 2010 report of the Citizens’ Initiatives on CEDAW-Bangladesh (CiC-BD) evidences such a possibility. However narrow and conservative, it is noteworthy that a coalition of NGOs in its report on an international convention has included the situation of CHT women. Regarding the Nari Nirjaton Special Tribunal (Women Repression Special Tribunal) under III.1.3.4 Institutional mechanisms established between 2004 and 2009 to protect women’s rights, the report states, ‘… Recently three tribunals have been set up in the three Councils of Rangamati, Khagrachari and Bandarban in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. This has provided access of women in the CHT to judicial processes in cases of violence’ (p 23), while regarding Patterns and Trends under II.11.5 Situation Analysis, the report says of women and children of religious and ethnic minority groups: ‘Gang violence is used by the majority/dominant elite to intimidate women and children of religious and ethnic minority groups. … Cases of custodial violence by law enforcement and security forces have been frequently reported, particularly in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (p 50). Many women’s rights organisations in CHT now have well-established links with Durbar Network, a network of women’s rights organisations, which operates in all districts of Bangladesh. Through the Durbar Network, instances of reported violence against women in the CHT is campaigned and protested at the same time of the day throughout the country, generating awareness and resistance against gender violence.
Recently, a coalition of left women’s organisations, trade unions and
left-inclined activists got together to form an open platform named,
‘Shomo Odhikar Amader Nunotomo Daabi (SAND)’, meaning ‘Equal rights is our minimum demand.’ At their recently held rally in Dhaka, on May 24 this year, they put forth the demand for a new Women Policy. SAND’s formation is in response to the National Women Development Policy 2011 which they deem unsatisfactory as it does not include women’s equal inheritance rights, a long-standing campaign of women’s rights movement in Bangladesh.
SAND’s campaign adds a new adaptive challenge in the women’s movement of Bangladesh. An earlier rally, supporting the National Women Development Policy 2011 on April 28, organised by the Samajik Pratirodh Committee, a platform of 67 women, development, and human rights organisations, and NGOs, called upon the government to take immediate measures for the full implementation of the policy. Samajik Pratirodh Committee acknowledges that the National Women Development Policy 2011 does not include equal inheritance, but argues that it is worthy of full support as it contains programmes aimed at improving women’s socio-economic condition: measures for reducing women's poverty, for enhancing women’s economic and political empowerment—food
security, health and nutrition, education and training, employment—improving the status of the girl child, resisting violence against women, in addition to undertaking special measures for indigenous women, and women who are handicapped (Rahnuma Ahmed, ‘A Postscript’, New Age, May 23, 2011).
CHT women too have demanded equal inheritance rights within their traditional patriarchal indigenous societies. Recently, a delegation of Chakma women, who have the support of their indigenous sisters of the CHT, submitted a memorandum on February 8, 2011 to the Chakma Raja claiming recognition of equal inheritance rights for Chakma women at a summit of the hill women in Rangamati. Meanwhile, women belonging to other indigenous groups, including Tripura, Tanchangya, Lushai, etc, of the CHT are also discussing the issue of formally claiming equal inheritance rights for themselves. SAND’s demands, it is important to note, incorporates the demands of indigenous peoples, both indigenous men and women in Bangladesh. Among its inclusive list of demands is: ‘constitutional recognition of adivasis (indigenous people); the inclusion of adivasi notions of property in the Constitution. Further, an end to the militarisation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the inclusion of measures which will ensure the safety and security of jumma women.’ Re-membering Kalpana today is also imagining a better future. Re-membering Kalpana is striving for a better world which allows us all to be equal citizens irrespective of our race, colour, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, and by adopting affirmative actions towards those who have been repressed and neglected for decades by the state’s wrong and ill policies. Regarding a better world, Canadian writer, poet and environmental activist Margaret Atwood reminds us that ‘…it is by the better world we can imagine that we judge the world we have’, and she cautions us, ‘[i]f we cease to judge this world, we may find ourselves, very quickly, in one which is infinitely
worse.’
In the action of ‘re-membering’, ‘putting-together’ today, our abducted friend and fellow traveller, Kalpana re-members our collective struggle for establishing our just rights. Kalpana re-members our collective resistance against injustice. Kalpana re-members our solidarity for equality, justice and peace. And, Kalpana, indeed, re-members a potential future of a conscious, all-inclusive women’s rights movement from the second decade in the 21st century Bangladesh.
mainstream human rights activists of Bangladesh regarding the CHT
situation. There was, and has been, support and solidarity from many mainstream human rights activists and their organisations, and a rise in increasing solidarity for CHT indigenous women’s cause from the mainstream women rights organisations. In the period immediately after Kalpana’s abduction, strong cooperation developed between mainstream Bengali women particularly represented by ‘Shommilita Nari Shomaj’ (literally meaning Collective Women’s Society) and indigenous women of the CHT in their protests against the lack of action over the abduction. ‘Shommilita Nari Shomaj’ was formed in August 1995 to protest state violence against women following an incident where a 13-year-old Bengali girl, Yasmin, was raped and then killed by three policemen in the northern district of Dinajpur. It was a coalition of mainstream Bengali women’s organisations including human rights organisations, development-oriented organisations, women activists from the Left, trade unions, lawyers, academics and students. Women belonging to the Hill Women’s Federation joined in to protest on the streets of Dhaka. In the wake of the campaign, NGOs and civil society organisations from 37 countries asked the Bangladesh government to rescue Kalpana Chakma immediately and conduct an inquiry into the incident. In many ways, Kalpana brought us together: indigenous and non-indigenous women in Bangladesh, Jumma indigenous women of CHT with other women of the world, and men who are indigenous, non-indigenous, Bengali, and non-Bengali.
In the second decade of the 21st century, the women’s movement of
Bangladesh shows ample possibilities to be inclusive of indigenous women's issues. The December 2010 report of the Citizens’ Initiatives on CEDAW-Bangladesh (CiC-BD) evidences such a possibility. However narrow and conservative, it is noteworthy that a coalition of NGOs in its report on an international convention has included the situation of CHT women. Regarding the Nari Nirjaton Special Tribunal (Women Repression Special Tribunal) under III.1.3.4 Institutional mechanisms established between 2004 and 2009 to protect women’s rights, the report states, ‘… Recently three tribunals have been set up in the three Councils of Rangamati, Khagrachari and Bandarban in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. This has provided access of women in the CHT to judicial processes in cases of violence’ (p 23), while regarding Patterns and Trends under II.11.5 Situation Analysis, the report says of women and children of religious and ethnic minority groups: ‘Gang violence is used by the majority/dominant elite to intimidate women and children of religious and ethnic minority groups. … Cases of custodial violence by law enforcement and security forces have been frequently reported, particularly in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (p 50). Many women’s rights organisations in CHT now have well-established links with Durbar Network, a network of women’s rights organisations, which operates in all districts of Bangladesh. Through the Durbar Network, instances of reported violence against women in the CHT is campaigned and protested at the same time of the day throughout the country, generating awareness and resistance against gender violence.
Recently, a coalition of left women’s organisations, trade unions and
left-inclined activists got together to form an open platform named,
‘Shomo Odhikar Amader Nunotomo Daabi (SAND)’, meaning ‘Equal rights is our minimum demand.’ At their recently held rally in Dhaka, on May 24 this year, they put forth the demand for a new Women Policy. SAND’s formation is in response to the National Women Development Policy 2011 which they deem unsatisfactory as it does not include women’s equal inheritance rights, a long-standing campaign of women’s rights movement in Bangladesh.
SAND’s campaign adds a new adaptive challenge in the women’s movement of Bangladesh. An earlier rally, supporting the National Women Development Policy 2011 on April 28, organised by the Samajik Pratirodh Committee, a platform of 67 women, development, and human rights organisations, and NGOs, called upon the government to take immediate measures for the full implementation of the policy. Samajik Pratirodh Committee acknowledges that the National Women Development Policy 2011 does not include equal inheritance, but argues that it is worthy of full support as it contains programmes aimed at improving women’s socio-economic condition: measures for reducing women's poverty, for enhancing women’s economic and political empowerment—food
security, health and nutrition, education and training, employment—improving the status of the girl child, resisting violence against women, in addition to undertaking special measures for indigenous women, and women who are handicapped (Rahnuma Ahmed, ‘A Postscript’, New Age, May 23, 2011).
CHT women too have demanded equal inheritance rights within their traditional patriarchal indigenous societies. Recently, a delegation of Chakma women, who have the support of their indigenous sisters of the CHT, submitted a memorandum on February 8, 2011 to the Chakma Raja claiming recognition of equal inheritance rights for Chakma women at a summit of the hill women in Rangamati. Meanwhile, women belonging to other indigenous groups, including Tripura, Tanchangya, Lushai, etc, of the CHT are also discussing the issue of formally claiming equal inheritance rights for themselves. SAND’s demands, it is important to note, incorporates the demands of indigenous peoples, both indigenous men and women in Bangladesh. Among its inclusive list of demands is: ‘constitutional recognition of adivasis (indigenous people); the inclusion of adivasi notions of property in the Constitution. Further, an end to the militarisation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the inclusion of measures which will ensure the safety and security of jumma women.’ Re-membering Kalpana today is also imagining a better future. Re-membering Kalpana is striving for a better world which allows us all to be equal citizens irrespective of our race, colour, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, and by adopting affirmative actions towards those who have been repressed and neglected for decades by the state’s wrong and ill policies. Regarding a better world, Canadian writer, poet and environmental activist Margaret Atwood reminds us that ‘…it is by the better world we can imagine that we judge the world we have’, and she cautions us, ‘[i]f we cease to judge this world, we may find ourselves, very quickly, in one which is infinitely
worse.’
In the action of ‘re-membering’, ‘putting-together’ today, our abducted friend and fellow traveller, Kalpana re-members our collective struggle for establishing our just rights. Kalpana re-members our collective resistance against injustice. Kalpana re-members our solidarity for equality, justice and peace. And, Kalpana, indeed, re-members a potential future of a conscious, all-inclusive women’s rights movement from the second decade in the 21st century Bangladesh.
Kabita Chakma is the coordinator of the CHT Jumma Peoples Network of
the Asia Pacific and the Human Rights Coordinator of the CHT
Indigenous Jumma Association Australia.
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Home | OP-ED | Kalindi Rani: 19th century Chakma queen regnant
Kalindi Rani: 19th century Chakma queen regnant
by Kabita Chakma
March 8, 2011 is the centenary of International Women’s Day, a global celebration of the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future. On the occasion of the centenary of International Women’s Day, I would like to introduce an extraordinary 19th century woman, Kalindi Rani, a queen regnant from South Asia.
I have two intersecting interests in introducing Kalindi Rani: firstly, Kalindi Rani’s struggle to establish herself as the queen regnant, rajrani, against the British and the existing patriarchal and patrilineal Chakma society; and secondly, Kalindi Rani’s struggle against the British colonisation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the southeast part of present day Bangladesh. However, Kalindi Rani remains largely absent from either the feminist discourse or the historical discourse of Bangladesh or South Asia.
Kalindi Rani’s life immediately precedes that of another notable woman, Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hussain (also written as Begum Roquiah Sakhawat Hussain) who was also born in present-day Bangladesh. Begum
Rokeya was born in 1880, seven years after Kalindi Rani’s death in 1873. Begum Rokeya was born in Pairaband, Rangpur, in British Bengal, while Kalindi Rani was born in a village called Kudukchari, on the base of Mount Phuramon in Rangamati, in pre-British, independent Chakma kingdom. Begum Rokeya is well known as an educator, writer, and a social worker, and is also celebrated as the first Islamic feminist.
Kalindi Rani, the Chakma queen regnant, was the 45th ruler in the history of the Chakma monarchy. She ruled the traditional Chakma kingdom, at the eastern edge of then British India, including parts of Chittagong and the Chittagong Hill Tracts of present-day Bangladesh from 1832 to1873. Kalindi Rani also had estates (zamindari) in the British-regulated district of Chittagong.
Kalindi Rani didn’t use armed resistance against British aggression as did her predecessors of the late 18th century, who fought over two and a half decades of war against the British between 1772 and 1798 (Suniti Bhushan Qanungo, 1998, Chakma Resistance to British Domination: 1772–1798). It is noteworthy that this resistance is the first recorded against the British in South Asia, long before the famous ‘sipahi bidroha’, the ‘Sepoy Rebellion’ in 1857. Rather than armed resistance, Kalindi Rani used western institutions, the courts and offices, and traditional agencies to resist colonisation.
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KALINDI Rani resisted both the institutions of Chakma patriarchy by establishing herself as the queen regnant, and resisted the institutions of power of the coloniser by assuming the throne and in protecting her kingdom, which the British annexed in 1860.
It was difficult for Kalindi Rani to assume the throne after her husband Raja Dharam Bux Khan died in 1832. The raja died in his mid-thirties, leaving three wives: Kalindi, the first wife; Atakbi, the second wife; and Haribi, the third wife. His only daughter Rajkumari Menaka was by his third wife Haribi. Chakma monarchy generally follows the law of primogeniture, which means that the eldest son succeeds the father. This could not be applied in the case of succession of Raja Dharm Bux Khan.
In 1832, to formalise her claim to the throne as the guardian of her stepdaughter Menaka, Kalindi Rani offered to pay the ‘Jum Banga’ tax to the British. The tax was introduced by the British in 1791 replacing a ‘cotton tribute’, and became a Permanent Settlement in 1793. According to historian AM Serajuddin, however, the Permanent Settlement of 1793 was a result of misinterpretation by the successive British administrators in which the tribute was treated as a revenue payable to the government (The Chakma Tribe of the Chittagong Hill Tracts in the 18th century, The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, No. 1, 1984, pp 90-98, p 94).
Chakma society did not, however, favour a female ruler. There were many conspiracies against her, and many opportunist groups initiating family feuds against Rani’s assumption of the throne.
Gobardhan, the adopted brother of the late Raja Dharam Bux Khan, was a prominent contestant for the throne. Gobardhan had patriarchal and historical precedence as his grandfather Raja Jabbar Khan succeeded
his brother Raja Tabbar Khan when he died childless in 1799. There was also mention of other collateral male heirs contending for the throne. Gobardhan and other contending heirs took their claims to the British authority, but ultimately failed. It appears that the British authority ultimately rejected the claims of Gobardhan and other contending heirs for the throne, perhaps because of Kalindi’s strategic use of western institutions. It is reported that Kalindi Rani’s use of the courts put Gobardhan and the other collateral male heirs in jail on a charge of rebellion and riot.
Taking advantage of the chaotic situation in Kalindi Rani’s realm, the British instituted a Court of Wards. The British, by acting as the guardian of the Princess Menaka, took over the royal estates in both Chittagong and the Chakma kingdom.
Family rivalry against Kalindi Rani eventually also came from the late Raja’s third wife Haribi Rani. It is recorded that in the midst of these turbulent years, Haribi, without consulting Kalindi, organized Menaka’s wedding with a Gopinath Dewan, and moved out of the palace (rajbari) to live with her daughter and son-in-law in a house she built at Sonaichari, a village near the capital Rajanagar in Rangunea.
Kalindi didn’t go through the futile exercise of trying to stop Haribi. She neither protested against the daughter’s wedding nor against Haribi’s relocation, but instead concentrated her energy on regaining control over the kingdom and estates in Chittagong.
After Kalindi Rani had succeeded in retaining her kingdom’s property, it is known that Haribi, with her daughter Menaka and son-in-law, returned to the palace upon receiving the pardon they had sought from the Rani. Later, Harish Chandra, son of Princess Menaka, would become raja upon Kalindi Rani’s death on September 22, 1873.
***
FOR Kalindi Rani, however, the struggle with the British authorities over the throne was even longer and more tortured than with the Chakma contestants for the throne.
To secure her right to rule, Kalindi first lodged a claim in the Judge’s Court, Chittagong, for the sole management of the estates in Chittagong. She also went to the Judge’s Court to establish her rights over the kingdom, outside the British regulation district of Chittagong.
Although Kalindi Rani’s succession to all the property of her late husband was supported by the civil court in 1832, and in 1833 the collector recommended that she should be in charge of all property and all property should be in her name, there was some withholding by the British authorities from fully recognising Kalindi Rani as the successor of her husband. A letter, dated August 26, 1842, from the commissioner of Chittagong indicates doubt about her capacity to manage the property.
In response to Rani’s appeal in 1932 for the sole management of all properties, the court appointed Shukalal Khan, a Dewan and a paternal relative of the late Raja, as a ‘sarbarakar’, meaning a person ‘having an authority to collect taxes’, until there was a decision about the legitimacy of Kalindi Rani’s claim to the throne. Many Chakmas did not accept the appointment by the British. As a consequence, there was an upheaval against the rule of law in the hill tracts. It appears that at that period many of the dewans, Chakma aristocrats, adopted the trappings of kings. This generally unstable situation was made worse by attacks from the neighbouring Lushai group. It is suspected that the dewans were hiring the Lushais to attack each other. It is not known on which date, but it is reported that during those chaotic years Shuklal Khan was murdered in his own residence by Lushais.
During these times of political struggle, Kalindi Rani tried every avenue to regain control over her kingdom’s property, even by leasing her own lands back from the British. By 1837 Kalindi managed to obtain the kingdom’s properties by leasing. But she denounced the leasing arrangement in 1839 and subsequently maintained her fight in the courts for permanent authority over her kingdom’s property.
Although gender bias was present to varying degrees in both the Chakma and British societies in different contexts, there were historical examples of both societies having female rulers. The Chakmas had previously had two queens regnant, Manekbi Rani and Kattua Rani, while the British had had Elizabeth I as queen regnant in the 17th century. Alexandrina Victoria, who assumed the British throne in 1837, was a contemporary to Kalindi Rani. However, no reference has yet been found that the British ever drew any comparison between the queens regnant in England and in the hill tracts.
British displeasure with Kalindi Rani was perhaps because of her gender, but more about her unwillingness to submit to the will of the British in the running of her own territory. British discontent may also have been to do with the colonial administrators’ anxiety and suspicion over her ability to yield tax for the colonial exchequer. It may, therefore, have been Rani’s non-cooperation with the economic interest of the British that deterred the authority from recognising her as the successor to Raja Dharam Bux Khan.
Finally, after 12 years of struggle, in 1844, the court issued an order that Kalindi Rani was the sole representative of all the properties of the late Raja Dharam Bux Khan. While Kalindi Rani established her rights to the properties of her kingdom and estates, the British never formally recognised Kalindi Rani’s position beyond that of a ‘sarbarakar’ or principal tax collector.
Kalindi Rani’s position as queen regnant is still a paradox in Chakma society. The present Chakma monarch, Raja Devasish Roy, the 50th raja, who is a barrister-at-law, states that in accordance with Chakma customary law, ‘Kalindi held—de facto—the Chakma rulership.’ However, in the history of the Chakma Raj, Kalindi Rani is recorded as the 45th ruler, the queen regnant of that time.
***
IN 1860, the British annexed the traditional Chakma kingdom as a part of a district naming it the Chittagong Hill Tracts by the Act XXII of 1860. The annexation came in the guise of providing security to the inhabitants of the hills, against the possible raids from the Kukis from the north-east hills. There is no evidence that the Chakmas had ever asked for protection from the British, instead there is evidence of Chakmas fighting the British in coalition with the Kukis during the Chakma resistance in the late 18th century. Whereas there has always been an underlying economic interest on the part of the British in the CHT.
In 1860, the Chittagong Hill Tracts had two major chiefs: Kalindi Rani in the north and centre; and the Bhomang Raja in the south. However, there were also some other chieftains from smaller indigenous groups who exercised authority over their people. Without formal recognition they were gradually forgotten.
The 1860 general instructions of the British government for the guidance of the hill tracts authorities included that ‘The customs and prejudices of the people [are] to be observed and respected. We are to interfere as little as possible between the chiefs and their tribes’ (Government of Bengal, Letter No. 3300, June 20, 1860).
Violation of the 1860 instructions is evident in the division of the Chakma kingdom into two parts, which the Rani resisted. Captain Thomas Herbert Lewin was appointed in the Chittagong Hill Tracts as the third superintendent in March 1866 and as the first deputy commissioner in 1868. Lewin, violating the 1860 instructions, appointed a Maung Kioja Sain, a Marma aristocrat (a roaza of Rani), as a ‘sarbarakar’ to collect revenue of the northern part of the Chakma kingdom. In October 1867, to formalise the partitioning of the northern part, Lewin recommended that the Hill Tracts should be divided into three revenue divisions or circles, respectively under the authority of the three chiefs.
Kalindi Rani took the matter to the court, but her appeal was rejected in 1870. In explaining the reason for dividing Rani’s kingdom it was noted that: ‘[t]hough nominally the northern section belonged to the Chakma Chief, yet owing to the distances there was no control over the people, and great inconveniences was experienced by the absence of any head to whom references could be made when occasion arose’ (Eastern Bengal and Assam District Gazetteers: Chittagong Hill Tracts, 1909, p 12). To protect the southern boundary, Kalindi Rani made a written agreement with the Bhomang chief in 1869.
Kalindi Rani not only lodged complaints against violation of the 1860 instructions to the commissioner in Chittagong, she also sent Harish Chandra, her grandson and future heir, to see the lieutenant-governor of Bengal in Calcutta to register her complaints. As a result, there was an independent inquiry into the CHT administration. It found that the regulations were not being sufficiently observed.
In 1873, the year Kalindi Rani died, the proposal containing division into circles, initially proposed by Lewin in 1867, was considered and it came into effect in 1884 creating a third circle known as the Mong circle. Thus, Rani’s kingdom was reduced to only one of the circles a number of years after her death.
Despite her resistance, Kalindi Rani’s rule saw the unfolding process in which the British ultimately proclaimed power over the indigenous authorities in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. The time of her reign was one of the most turbulent in Chakma history as it saw the transition of the Chakmas from an independent people to subjects of the British.
***
KALINDI Rani’s rule of the Chakma Kingdom from 1832 to1873 exposes an indomitable leadership. British bureaucrat RH Sneyd Hutchinson’s statement provides an insight of the British view of Kalindi Rani, ‘…[F]or forty years she proved a thorn in the side of the Government, she was an exceedingly able woman, and having surrounded herself with Bengali Lawyers from Chittagong, fought very hard to avoid meeting her obligation, and put forward all sorts of real and Imaginary claims to land settlements in the Chittagong District itself. She exercised a very great influence over her tribe and was generally feared’ (An Account of Chittagong Hill Tracts, 1906, p 94).
From a feminist perspective, it is quite refreshing for me to present the queen regnant of nearly two centuries ago in the contemporary gender equality debate of the Chakmas. Consideration of Kalindi Rani, the queen regnant, a widow without a male heir but with a stepdaughter, allows serious questioning of today’s treatment of women under the traditional customary inheritance law of the patrilineal society of the Chakmas, where gender inequalities in both royal and commoner practices are evident.
It is noteworthy that recently, on February 8, 2011, the Chakma women, with their other indigenous sisters of the CHT, submitted a memorandum claiming recognition of equal inheritance rights for the Chakma women
to Raja Devasish Roy, Chakma Raja, Chief of the Chakma Administrative Circle, at a summit of the hill women organised by Women Resource Network in Rangamati.
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Some parts of this article were presented in a paper ‘Kalindi Rani: The Formidable Chakma Queen Regnant of the 19th Century’, at the tenth anniversary of Women in Asia conference on Crisis, Agency, and Change at the Australian National University, Canberra, September 29-October 1, 2010. Kabita Chakma is the coordinator of the CHT Jumma Peoples Network of the Asia Pacific and the Human Rights Coordinator of the CHT Indigenous Jumma Association Australia.
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