In
response to Government's continued high-handedness, repression
and lack of interests in solving the problems faced by the
southern Bhutanese, the Lhotshampas organised human rights
and pro-democratic rallies in all southern districts. The
following main events preceded the protest rallies :
Mr.
Tek Nath. Rizal fled the country and took shelter in Guwahati,
Assaam in India in July, 1988. After nearly two months and
concerned about his safety, he crossed over to Indo-Nepal
border and stayed at Birtamode, Jhapa, a border town in eastern
Nepal. He founded the People Forum for Human Rights, Bhutan
at Birtamode, Nepal on July 7, 1989.
A
clandestine and underground students organisation called the
Students Union of Bhutan (SUB) was formed for the first time
in Bhutan by the students of Kanglung Degree College on 23rd
March, 1988. Mr. Bishwanath Chhetri, Mr. R .P. Subba, Mr.
I. B. Pathak and Deo Dutta Sharma were prominent among the
founding members. This group clandestinely operated and extended
their activities in other educational institutions such as
National Institute of Education (NIE) Samchi, Deothang Polytechnic,
Samchi Central School, Royal Technical Institute, Kharbandi
etc. SUB was formed to enlighten the people and students about
the racial and discriminatory policies of the government.
Mr.
Ratan Gazmere, a London trained Science lecturer of National
Institute of Education was arrested from his official quarter
at midnight on October 28, 1989 for authoring a booklet entitled
'Bhutan : We Want Justice'. On November 3, 1989, Mr. Man Bahadur
Chhetri, Mr. Ranga Sharma and Mr. Dil Bahadur Gurung, all
students of NIE were arrested. They were tortured in police
custody. Mr. Man Bahadur Chhetri 21 died in police custody
due to heavy torture. His dead body was handed over to his
parents by police saying that he committed suicide in the
police custody.
Bishwanath
Chhetri, President of Students Union of Bhutan was arrested
from Kanglung College on November 5, 1989. After his arrests,
all the members of SUB and Lhotshampa students in Kanglung
College, NIE, Deothang Polytechnic, Royal Technical Institute
and other educational institutions in southern Bhutan fled
the country and took shelter in adjoining Indian border towns.
Mr. Tek Nath Rizal along with Jogen Gazmere, and Mr. Sushil
Pokhrel were abducted at midnight on November 16, 1989 from
Birtamod, Jhapa by the Bhutanese government agents and were
taken to Thimphu, Bhutan..
Thereafter,
the government started crackdown on prominent Lhotshampas
as well as innocent villagers. All the schools in southern
districts were closed down and converted into Army barracks.
Army was deployed in all southern districts and an undeclared
martial law prevailed thereafter. The in-country movement
of Lhotshampas were severely checked. In the inner districts
such as Chirang and Dagana, police banned the movement of
food commodities. Even the common salt was not allowed to
be taken to Chirang and Dagana districts.
The expatriate headmasters of schools
were replaced by the northern Drukpa teachers despite their
low qualifications. The Jesuit Fathers who were teaching in
various schools were asked to leave the country. Drukpa headmasters
encouraged the Drukpa students to humiliate the Lhotshampa
students, which led the students to leave the schools and
join the other students at Garganda tea garden in the state
of West Bengal, on Bhutan-India borders, the head quarters
of exiled dissident organisations.
PEACEFUL
DEMONSTRATIONS AND RALLIES IN 1990
When
all traditional channels of communications with the government
of Bhutan were exhausted, the public of southern districts
held a series of peaceful rallies in the months of September
and October, 1990 to vent their grievances against the excesses
of the Royal government with the hope that with this show
of public protest, the government would make an objective
assessment of the situation and reassess their racial and
discriminatory policies.
More
than 25,000 people gathered at Garganda to launch peaceful
demonstrations and protest rallies in Bhutan on 26th August,
1990. However, the Indian police did not allow the demonstrators
to pass through Indian soil. They crated barricades and promulgated
prohibitory orders banning the Bhutanese demonstrators to
move a distant of around 30 km from Garganda to Phuenstholing
Bhutan, the gateway through Indian territory. While inside
Bhutan a dawn to dusk curfew was imposed in Phuentsholing
and the gun-trotting army personnel were deployed.
On
17 September, 1990, the first ever peaceful protest rally
and demonstration in the entire history of Bhutan was organised
at Ghumaounay, Samchi district (in southern Bhutan). Peaceful
rallies were organised in all six districts of southern Bhutan
namely, Samtse, Chhuka, Tsirang, Dagana, Sarpang and Samdrup
Jonkhar on September 19, 1990. These were participated by
the peasants, students, businessmen, teachers and the government
servants. On September 23 and 24, 1990 peaceful rallies were
organised at Samrang and Diafam, in south-eastern Bhutan,
respectively. A second peaceful rally was organised in Chirang
district on October 4, 1990. In all cases, the leaders of
the peaceful rallies handed over a memorandum demanding human
rights, judicial and legislative reforms to the government
through the district authorities.
The
government resorted repressive measures and the security forces
fired indiscriminately killing many innocent villagers in
Sipsoo, Chengmari and at Samtse bridge. On September 22, 1990,
the security forces beat the demonstrators with batons at
Phuentsholing and most of the demonstrators were arrested
and tortured. The security forces resorted to indiscriminate
firing at peaceful demonstrators at Pugli.
Continued:
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Atrocities for
continuity of the events leading to exodus of Lhotshampas
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