Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

India–Bangladesh Land Border: A Flawed Inheritance and a Problematic Future

2011; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 35; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/09700161.2011.591763

1754-0054

Smruti S. Pattanaik,

South Asian Studies and Diaspora

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1. Van Schendel, The Bengal Borderland: Beyond State and Nation in South Asia, London, Anthem South Asian Studies, 2005, p. 40. 2. Ibid., p. 44. 3. Ibid., p. 221. The natural border was also problematic. For example, is Mathabhanga river which is mostly rain fed and the Taradhar char in the river Ichhamati was bitterly contested. 4. Joya Chatterji, ‘The Fashioning of a Frontier: The Radcliffe Line and Bengal's Border Landscape, 1947–52’, Modern Asian Studies, 33(1), 1999, p. 193. 5. Van Schendel, no. 1, p. 56. 6. Nehru, Indian Foreign Policy: Selected Speeches, September 1946–April 1961, Publication Division, Government of India, 1961, p. 496. For example as mentioned in William van Schendel, a border river that is identified as Kushiara in the Boundary Commission report did not bear that name and the river was bifurcated at places making it difficult to determine which branch of Barak, Bogha-Kushiara river should be accepted as boundary’; ‘Bengal's Eastern Borderland’, Anthem South Asian Studies, 2005, p. 56. 7. A.S. Bhasin, ‘India-Bangladesh Relations’, Documents 1971–2002, 4, 2003, p. 1891. 8. Statement in Loksabha, 2 July 1973 as quoted in A.S. Bhasin, ‘Indo-Bangladesh Relations, Documents 1971–2002’, vol. 4, 2003, p.1893. 9. Nehru, ibid., p. 494. 10. Willian van Schendel, ‘Stateless in South Asia: The Making of the India–Bangladesh Enclaves’, The Journal of Asian Studies 61, 1, February 2002, p. 124. 11. Author interview with a senior BSF officer in Delhi, on 1 July 2011. 12. Wasbir Hussain, ‘Demographic Jitters’, Outlook, 20 September 2004, available at http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?225190 (accessed 5 May 2011). 13. For details see Sanjib Pohit and Nisha Taneja, ‘India's Informal Trade with Bangladesh: A Qualitative Assessment’, at http://www.cipe.org/programs/informalsector/articles/pdf/p-ban.pdf (accessed 17 August 2010). 14. Ibid., note 7, p. 1903. 15. Ibid. 16. Deputy Commissioner Karimganj M Angamuthu, stated in a note of 18 May 2009 about the ‘Status of Indo-Bangladesh Border Road Cum Fencing in Karimganj district’, as cited in the Hindustan Times, January 31, 2010. 17. See ‘No-Man's Land at Indo-Bangla Border’, available at http://www.zeenews.com/news600389.html (accessed August 2010). 18. Joint Indo-Bangladesh Guidelines for border authorities of the two countries, 1975, article 8(c); see A.S. Bhasin, d 7, p. 1904.