Second phase of eviction plan in the offing

By Sangey Oendrey in Thimphu, Bishal Budathoki in Phuentsholing and Dhruva Pradhan in Samdrup Jongkhar
As the third country settlement in nearing to begin of the exiled Bhutanese, the Bhutan government finalised its final plan to evict another 80,000 southern Bhutanese of Nepali origin in the next few years.

In the recently held mock polls, at least 70,000 southern Bhutanese have been denied to use their adult franchise, thus restricting them of being the citizen of the country. The process of eviction is planned to begin early 2008 when the settlement process begins from Nepal.

US, Canada, Australia, Denmak among others western countries have agreed to lend hand to resettled some of the exiled Bhutanese in their effort to find a permanent solution of the prolonged crisis. For Bhutan, this became the opportunity for another round of eviction.

Bhutan News Service talked to many southern Bhutanese who arrived neighbouring India and Nepal in their personal works. Frustrated, intimidated and psychologically tortured they are. They way of talking, daily behaviour and thinking vividly reflected the immense and mammoth but planned tortured to these people.

In many cases, the government has used the northern Bhutanese settled in the south as agent to torture these people.

People of Nepali origin are not allowed for higher education, with very few exceptions who have close links with the ministers or royal family. Their children have to go through rigorous verification before being enrolled into the schools. While the United Nations Development Program had expressed satisfaction towards progress made by Bhutan on millennium goals, over 20,000 children in have been strategically restricted from attending schools in southern Bhutan. The UNICEF in its report claimed all children in Bhutan are getting education.

Ironically, the UN agencies in Bhutan, mostly stationed in Thimphu, have never ever visited southern Bhutan from where more than 100,000 citizens were evicted in early 1990s. The national reports by the government, which are backed by the UN agencies, have never mentioned anything about the situation of southern Bhutan.

According to sources in Gelephu, Phuentsholing and Thimphu, the government has heightened the necessity of No Objection Certificate (NOC) for all the southern Bhutanese who wish to enrol their child in schools. Further, those willing to carry on with their higher education, join the government service or start personal business have to get NOC from the local security officials. On various pretexts, mostly for family relations with those already evicted southern Bhutanese, the local authority denying issuing NOC to southern Bhutanese.

At least a dozen school and college level teachers have been terminated from their job in the last three months. Lhotshamps getting retired from the government services have been removed from pension facilities.

Chief election commissioner Kunzang Wangdi in his recent interview with BBC also hinted the eviction of southern Bhutanese. He said those having no citizenship would not be registered in the election commission and are not allowed to vote. BNS has received a number of mails saying the government has been lingering southern Bhutanese attending their age to get citizenship to issue the certificates. The process of delaying for issuing citizenship had begun as early as 1999.

After the government decided to change the format of citizenship few years back, most southern Bhutanese are asked to submit their old citizenship cards. And then after, the local authority asked them to go Thimphu for a new one while in Thimphu they are told that local authority would be issuing the certificates.

Many who were not allowed to vote in the recent mock election include these persons whose citizenship certificates have been taken by the government but not issued a new one. 

In another report, the government has begun the process of demolishing the Hindu temples and holy places in southern Bhutan recently. Buddhist temples and shrines have been constructed. Details are yet to arrive. Bhutan News Service