Unexpected neighbours: The impact of the rohingya refugee influx on the education of indigenous communities in Teknaf

Abstract

Following the genocide on the Rohingya people in Myanmar back in August 2017, about 1 million refugees have entered Bangladesh, which has created astronomic pressure on the host community. Beyond immediate issues of accommodation and social cohesion that have risen, a secondary challenge has been the impact of the refugee camps on the education. In this context, this dissertation examines the impact of the Rohingya refugee camps on the education of nearby indigenous community members and how all the immediate effects due to the creation of camps synergise and decrease their ability for them to access education. This research focuses on the indigenous community members in order to explore how difficult it may be for them to cope with such difficulties because of their already-marginalised status, hence, their lack of social and cultural capital compared to their Bengali counterparts. Given the paucity of data on indigenous communities and their education as well as a lack of detailed information on the impact of the camps on the host community, the following research is a qualitative and exploratory study, where its primary data has been directly collected from the effected members through focus group discussions, and also NGO experts through one-on-one interviews. The subsequent findings of this research indicate that due to the combination of factors such as increased distance, lack of mobility, the additional responsibility of accompanying children, decrease in financial capacities, following the creation of the refugee camps, and finally, Covid-19, school attendance had greatly reduced and dropout rates also increased for the children of the indigenous Chakma communities of Teknaf. The aforementioned findings have been analysed using Amartya Sen’s theory of social exclusion and capabilities deprivation to understand how the reduced access to education may shift the community’s ability to cope with economic or social adversities that go beyond simply education. The following dissertation therefore contributes to existing studies standing as research conducted solely on the indigenous communities near the refugee camps and to existing theory by showcasing how lack of access to functional resources impact their capabilities to cope with adversities and how under specific circumstances, an external community has the capability to further marginalise a nation’s own members.